aken it out and put it back while we
were away."

"Who could have had access to your writing table?"

"Oh, anybody, because, you see, the drawers were never locked. We
thought it must have been one of the servants."

"Had anyone been to the house during your absence?"

"No. Nobody, except, of course, my two nephews; and neither of them had
touched it, because we asked them, and they both said they had not."

"Thank you." Anstey sat down, and Mrs. Hornby having given another
correcting twist to her bonnet, was about to step down from the box when
Sir Hector rose and bestowed upon her an intimidating stare.

"You made some reference," said he, "to a society--the Society of
Paralysed Idiots, I think, whatever that may be. Now what caused you to
make that reference?"

"It was a mistake; I was thinking of something else."

"I know it was a mistake. You referred to a paper that was in your
hand."

"I did not refer to it, I merely looked at it. It is a letter from the
Society of Paralysed Idiots. It is nothing to do with me really, you
know; I don't belong to the society, or anything of that sort."

"Did you mistake that paper for some other paper?"

"Yes, I took it for a paper with some notes on it to assist my memory."

"What kind of notes?"

"Oh, just the questions I was likely to be asked."

"Were the answers that you were to give to those questions also written
on the paper?"

"Of course they were. The questions would not have been any use without
the answers."

"Have you been asked the questions that were written on the paper?"

"Yes; at least, some of them."

"Have you given the answers that were written down?"

"I don't think I have--in fact, I am sure I haven't, because, you see--"

"Ah! you don't think you have." Sir Hector Trumpler smiled significantly
at the jury, and continued--

"Now who wrote down those questions and answers?"

"My nephew, Walter Hornby. He thought, you know--"

"Never mind what he thought. Who advised or instructed him to write them
down?"

"Nobody. It was entirely his own idea, and very thoughtful of him, too,
though Dr. Jervis took the paper away from me and said I must rely on my
memory."

Sir Hector was evidently rather taken aback by this answer, and sat down
suddenly, with a distinctly chapfallen air.

"Where is this paper on which the questions and answers are written?"
asked the judge. In anticipation of this inquiry I had already handed it
to Thorndyke