"Then he was always listening out for some one he called 'the man with
the limp.' Five and six times a night he'd have me up to listen with
him. 'There he goes, Beeton!' he'd whisper, crouching with his ear
pressed flat to the door. 'Do you hear him dragging himself along?'

"God knows how I've stood it as I have; for I've known no peace since
we left China. Once we got here I thought it would be better, but it's
been worse.

"Gentlemen have come (from the India Office, I believe), but he would
not see them. Said he would see no one but Mr. Nayland Smith. He had
never lain in his bed until to-night, but what with taking no proper
food nor sleep, and some secret trouble that was killing him by inches,
he collapsed altogether a while ago, and I carried him in and laid him
on the bed as I told you. Now he's dead--now he's dead."

Beeton leant up against the mantelpiece and buried his face in his
hands, whilst his shoulders shook convulsively. He had evidently been
greatly attached to his master, and I found something very pathetic in
this breakdown of a physically strong man. Smith laid his hands upon
his shoulders.

"You have passed through a very trying ordeal," he said, "and no man
could have done his duty better; but forces beyond your control have
proved too strong for you. I am Nayland Smith."

The man spun around with a surprising expression of relief upon his
pale face.

"So that whatever can be done," continued my friend, "to carry out
your master's wishes, will be done now. Rely upon it. Go into your
room and lie down until we call you."

"Thank you, sir, and thank God you are here," said Beeton dazedly, and
with one hand raised to his head he went, obediently, to the smaller
bedroom and disappeared within.

"Now, Petrie," rapped Smith, glancing around the littered floor,
"since I am empowered to deal with this matter as I see fit, and since
you are a medical man, we can devote the next half-hour, at any rate,
to a strictly confidential inquiry into this most perplexing case. I
propose that you examine the body for any evidences that may assist
you determining the cause of death, whilst I make a few inquiries here."

I nodded, without speaking, and went into the bedroom. It contained not
one solitary item of the dead man's belongings, and in every way bore
out Beeton's statement that Sir Gregory had never inhabited it. I bent
over Hale, as he lay fully dressed upon the bed.

Saving the singularity of