nt generally--some secrecy as to the lady's visit to his chambers."

"Do you know who the woman was?" I asked.

"No, I don't know," he replied. "I have a rather strong suspicion that I
can identify her, but I am waiting for some further facts."

"Is your suspicion founded on some new matter that you have discovered,
or is it deducible from facts that are known to me?"

"I think," he replied, "that you know practically all that I know,
although I have, in one instance, turned a very strong suspicion into a
certainty by further inquiries. But I think you ought to be able to form
some idea as to who this lady probably was."

"But no woman has been mentioned in the case at all."

"No; but I think you should be able to give this lady a name,
notwithstanding."

"Should I? Then I begin to suspect that I am not cut out for
medico-legal practice, for I don't see the faintest glimmer of a
suggestion."

Thorndyke smiled benevolently. "Don't be discouraged, Jervis," said he.
"I expect that when you first began to go round the wards, you doubted
whether you were cut out for medical practice. I did. For special work
one needs special knowledge and an acquired faculty for making use of
it. What does a second year's student make of a small thoracic aneurysm?
He knows the anatomy of the chest; he begins to know the normal heart
sounds and areas of dullness; but he cannot yet fit his various items of
knowledge together. Then comes the experienced physician and perhaps
makes a complete diagnosis without any examination at all, merely from
hearing the patient speak or cough. He has the same facts as the
student, but he has acquired the faculty of instantly connecting an
abnormality of function with its correleated anatomical change. It is a
matter of experience. And, with your previous training, you will soon
acquire the faculty. Try to observe everything. Let nothing escape you.
And try constantly to find some connection between facts and events that
seem to be unconnected. That is my advice to you; and with that we will
put away the Blackmore case for the present and consider our day's work
at an end."

Chapter XIV

Thorndyke Lays the Mine

The information supplied by Mr. Samuel Wilkins, so far from dispelling
the cloud of mystery that hung over the Blackmore case, only enveloped
it in deeper obscurity, so far as I was concerned. The new problem that
Thorndyke offered for solution was a tougher one than any of the ot