could you favour us with your company for an hour or
two? We will begin our investigation by a visit to Aldgate Station.
Good-bye, Mycroft. I shall let you have a report before evening, but I
warn you in advance that you have little to expect."

An hour later Holmes, Lestrade and I stood upon the Underground
railroad at the point where it emerges from the tunnel immediately
before Aldgate Station. A courteous red-faced old gentleman
represented the railway company.

"This is where the young man's body lay," said he, indicating a spot
about three feet from the metals. "It could not have fallen from
above, for these, as you see, are all blank walls. Therefore, it could
only have come from a train, and that train, so far as we can trace it,
must have passed about midnight on Monday."

"Have the carriages been examined for any sign of violence?"

"There are no such signs, and no ticket has been found."

"No record of a door being found open?"

"None."

"We have had some fresh evidence this morning," said Lestrade. "A
passenger who passed Aldgate in an ordinary Metropolitan train about
11:40 on Monday night declares that he heard a heavy thud, as of a body
striking the line, just before the train reached the station. There
was dense fog, however, and nothing could be seen. He made no report
of it at the time. Why, whatever is the matter with Mr. Holmes?"

My friend was standing with an expression of strained intensity upon
his face, staring at the railway metals where they curved out of the
tunnel. Aldgate is a junction, and there was a network of points. On
these his eager, questioning eyes were fixed, and I saw on his keen,
alert face that tightening of the lips, that quiver of the nostrils,
and concentration of the heavy, tufted brows which I knew so well.

"Points," he muttered; "the points."

"What of it? What do you mean?"

"I suppose there are no great number of points on a system such as
this?"

"No; they are very few."

"And a curve, too. Points, and a curve. By Jove! if it were only so."

"What is it, Mr. Holmes? Have you a clue?"

"An idea--an indication, no more. But the case certainly grows in
interest. Unique, perfectly unique, and yet why not? I do not see any
indications of bleeding on the line."

"There were hardly any."

"But I understand that there was a considerable wound."

"The bone was crushed, but there was no great external injury."

"And yet one would have ex