nt, penetrative. I have often wondered if this man of mine
would find any great difficulty in seeing through a brick wall!"

"He would be a useful person, perhaps, in solving the present
mystery," said I. "The police seem to have got no further."

"Ah, the Quick business?" remarked Lorrimore. "Um!--well, as regards
that, it seems to me that whatever light is thrown on it will have to
be thrown from the other angle--from Devonport. From all that I heard
and gathered, it's very evident that what is really wanted is a strict
examination into the immediate happenings at Noah Quick's inn, and
also into the antecedents of Noah and Salter. But is there anything
fresh?"

I told him, briefly, all that had happened that afternoon--of the
information given by James Beeman and of the disappearance of the
tobacco-box.

"That's odd!" he remarked. "Let's see--it was the old gentleman I saw
at Ravensdene Court who had some fancy about that box, wasn't it?--Mr.
Cazalette. What was his idea, now?"

"Mr. Cazalette," I replied, "saw, or fancied he saw, certain marks or
scratches within the lid of the box which he took to have some
meaning: they were, he believed, made with design--with some purpose.
He thought that by photographing them, and then enlarging his
photograph, he would bring out those marks more clearly, and possibly
find out what they were really meant for."

"Yes?" said Lorrimore. "Well--what has he discovered?"

"Up to now nobody knows," said Miss Raven. "Mr. Cazalette won't tell
us anything."

"That looks as if he had discovered something," observed Lorrimore.
"But--old gentlemen are a little queer, and a little vain. Perhaps
he's suddenly going to let loose a tremendous theory and wants to
perfect it before he speaks. Oh, well!" he added, almost
indifferently, "I've known a good many murder mysteries in my
time--out in India--and I always found that the really good way of
getting at the bottom of them was to go right back!--as far back as
possible. If I were the police in charge of these cases, I should put
one question down before me and do nothing until I'd exhausted every
effort to solve it."

"And that would be--what?" I asked.

"This," said he. "What were the antecedents of Noah and Salter Quick?"

"You think they had a past?" suggested Miss Raven.

"Everybody has a past," answered Lorrimore. "It may be this; it may be
that. But nearly all the problems of the present have their origin and
solution in t