test confidence, the matter which is puzzling me. I live in
hourly dread of some catastrophe the nature of which I'm utterly at a
loss to determine. Can you define intuition?"

My question held him in pensive silence. His manner changed as he
looked me straight in the face. Unlike his usual careless self--for
his was a curious character of the semi-Bohemian order and Savage Club
type--he grew serious and thoughtful, regarding me with critical gaze
after removing his pipe from his lips.

"Well," he exclaimed at last. "I'll tell you what it is, Boyd. This
intuition, or whatever you may call it, is an infernally bad thing for
you. I'm your friend--one of your best and most devoted friends, old
chap--and if there's anything in it, I'll render you whatever help I
can."

"Thank you, Ambler," I said gratefully, taking his hand. "I have told
you all this to-night in order to enlist your sympathy, although I
scarcely liked to ask your aid. Your life is a busy one--busier even
than my own, perhaps--and you have no desire to be bothered with my
personal affairs."

"On the contrary, old fellow," he said. "Remember that in mystery I'm
in my element."

"I know," I replied. "But at present there is no mystery--only
suspicion."

What Ambler Jevons had asserted was a fact. He was an investigator of
mysteries, making it his hobby just as other men take to collecting
curios or pictures. About his personal appearance there was nothing
very remarkable. When pre-occupied he had an abrupt, rather brusque
manner, but at all other times he was a very easy-going man of the
world, possessor of an ample income left him by his aunt, and this he
augmented by carrying on, in partnership with an elder man, a
profitable tea-blending business in Mark Lane.

He had entered the tea trade not because of necessity, but because he
considered it a bad thing for a man to lead an idle life.
Nevertheless, the chief object of his existence had always seemed to
be the unravelling of mysteries of police and crime. Surely few men,
even those professional investigators at Scotland Yard, held such a
record of successes. He was a born detective, with a keen scent for
clues, an ingenuity that was marvellous, and a patience and endurance
that were inexhaustible. At Scotland Yard the name of Ambler Jevons
had for several years been synonymous with all that is clever and
astute in the art of detecting crime.

To be a good criminal investigator a man must be born