Yes. That interview convinced me more than ever that she was, in some manner, cognisant of the truth. The secret existence of old Mr. Courtenay, the man whom I myself had pronounced dead, was the crowning point of the strange affair; and yet I felt by some inward intuition that this fact was not unknown to her. All the remarkable events of that moonlit night when I had followed husband and wife along the river-bank came back to me, and I saw vividly the old man's face, haggard and drawn, just as it had been in life. Surely there could be no stranger current of events than those which formed the Seven Secrets. They were beyond explanation--all of them. I knew nothing. I had certainly seen results; but I knew not their cause. Nitrate of amyl was not a drug which a costermonger would select with a view to committing suicide. Indeed, I daresay few of my readers, unless they are doctors or chemists, have ever before heard of it. Therefore my own conclusion, fully endorsed by the erratic Ambler, was that the poor fellow had been secretly poisoned. Nearly a fortnight passed, and I heard nothing of Ambler. He was still "out of town." Day by day passed, but nothing of note transpired. Sir Bernard was still suffering from a slight touch of sciatica at home, and on visiting him one Sunday I found him confined to his bed, grumbling and peevish. He was eccentric in his miserly habits and his hatred of society, beyond doubt; and the absurdities which his enemies attributed to him were not altogether unfounded. But he had, at all events, the rare quality of entertaining for his profession a respect nearly akin to enthusiasm. Indeed, according to his views, the faculty possessed almost infallible qualities. In confidence he had more than once admitted to me that certain of his colleagues practising in Harley Street were amazing donkeys; but he would never have allowed anyone else to say so. From the moment a man acquired that diploma which gave him the right over life and death, that man became, in his eyes, an august personage for the world at large. It was a crime, he thought, for a patient not to submit to his decision, and certainly it must be admitted that his success in the treatment of nervous disorders had been most remarkable. "You were at that lecture by Deboutin, of Paris, the other day!" he exclaimed to me suddenly, while I was seated at his bedside describing the work I had been doing for him in London. "Why didn't you tell me you were going there?" "I went quite unexpectedly--with a friend." "With whom?" "Ambler Jevons." "Oh, that detective fellow!" laughed the old physician. "Well," he added, "it was all very interesting, wasn't it?" "Very--especially your own demonstrations. I had no idea that you were in correspondence with Deboutin." He laughed; then, with a knowing look, said: