were
completed, and I proceeded forthwith to retail to my colleague those
extracts from my conversation with Juliet that I have just recorded.

He listened, as usual, with deep and critical attention.

"This is very interesting and important," he said, when I had finished;
"really, Jervis, you are a most invaluable coadjutor. It seems that
information, which would be strictly withheld from the forbidding
Jorkins, trickles freely and unasked into the ear of the genial Spenlow.
Now, I suppose you regard your hypothesis as having received very
substantial confirmation?"

"Certainly, I do."

"And very justifiably. You see now how completely you were in the right
when you allowed yourself to entertain this theory of the crime in spite
of its apparent improbability. By the light of these new facts it has
become quite a probable explanation of the whole affair, and if it could
only be shown that Mr. Hornby's memorandum block was among the papers on
the table, it would rise to a high degree of probability. The obvious
moral is, never disregard the improbable. By the way, it is odd that
Reuben failed to recall this occurrence when I questioned him. Of
course, the bloody finger-marks were not discovered until he had gone,
but one would have expected him to recall the circumstance when I asked
him, pointedly, if he had never left bloody finger-prints on any
papers."

"I must try to find out if Mr. Hornby's memorandum block was on the
table and among the marked papers," I said.

"Yes, that would be wise," he answered, "though I don't suppose the
information will be forthcoming."

My colleague's manner rather disappointed me. He had heard my report
with the greatest attention, he had discussed it with animation, but yet
he seemed to attach to the new and--as they appeared to me--highly
important facts an interest that was academic rather than practical. Of
course, his calmness might be assumed; but this did not seem likely, for
John Thorndyke was far too sincere and dignified a character to
cultivate in private life the artifices of the actor. To strangers,
indeed, he presented habitually a calm and impassive exterior; but this
was natural to him, and was but the outward sign of his even and
judicial habit of mind.

No; there was no doubt that my startling news had left him unmoved, and
this must be for one of two reasons: either he already knew all that I
had told him (which was perfectly possible), or he had some other