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GETTING INSIDE JAVA -
EGINNERS GUIDE

BY

F5 DEVELOPERS
ISBN 978-93-5438-645-9

© F5 Developers 2020

Published in India 2020 by Pencil

A brand of

One Point Six Technologies Pvt. Ltd.

123, Building J2, Shram Seva Premises,

Wadala Truck Terminal, Wadala (E)

Mumbai 400037, Maharashtra, INDIA

E connect@thepencilapp.com

W www.thepencilapp.com

All rights reserved worldwide

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or
introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form,
or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of
the Publisher. Any person who commits an unauthorized act in
relation to this publication can be liable to criminal prosecution
and civil claims for damages.

DISCLAIMER: The opinions expressed in this book are those of the

authors and do not purport to reflect the views of the
 Author biography

Destiny drew Prem Kumar towards computers when the IT

industry was just making a big evolution in India. Having
completed his education from Silli Polytechnic in Computer
Science Engineering. He moved on with his higher studies
from Gandhi Institute for Technology, Bhubaneshwar.

Prem has a passion for exploring IT knowledge and is founder

of well-growing, a startup company "F5 Developers". He is a
much sought after speaker on various technology subjects and
is a regular columnist for Open Source and OSE Hub. His
current affiliations include being a Founder of F5 Developers, a
multi-service provider company including the subsidiary
companies of F5, i.e, THOR, F5 Initiative and OSE Hub. In
recognition to his contribution Microsoft awarded him the
prestigious “Microsoft Technology Associate” award in 2019 for
Java Programming. He can be reached at
 Contents

Module I – Introduction to Java Programming

Java – An Overview

History of Java

Features of Java

Getting Started with Java

Module II – JDK, JRE and JVM

Difference between JDK, JRE and JVM

JVM Architecture

Variables, Data Types, Operators

Module III – OOPs using Java

Concept of OOPs

Classes and Objects

Inheritence

Polymorphism

Encapsulation

Abstraction

Methods and Constructors

Module IV – Multithreading

Overview of Multithreading

Lifecycle and States of a Thread

Main Thread
Thread Priority

Garbage Collection

Module V – Java Misc.

Java Applets

Exception Handling
 Epigraph

“Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.

Prem Kumar
 Acknowledgements

It is a journey of almost a new beginning with the stage the

book idea of “Getting Inside Java – Beginners Guide” is
conceived up to the release of its First Edition. During this
journey I have met so many students, developers, professors,
publishers and authors who expressed their opinions about
Java. They have been the main motivators in my effort to
complete this book. In particular I am indebted to Miss Priya
who had a faith in this book idea, believed in my writing
ability, whispered the words of encouragement and made
helpful suggestions from time to time. I indebted to God for
having such supporting parents, without them I was unable to
gain a bit of knowledge. With this, I would like to thank my
father, Dr. Rajan Mahto and my mother, Mrs. Manju Devi for
making me such able.

During this course people like R.K.Raja, Mohit Kumar, Rohit

Kumar, and Priya helped in writing programs, spotting bugs,
drawing figures and preparing index. I trust that with their
collective acumen all the programs would run correctly in all
situations. I would like to thanks to all the members of F5
Developers, my startup company. I am hopeful that their
dream has been realized. I thank Priya, my friend, for her
friendship and for her contributions in everything that I do in
IT in ways more than she could ever guess. Though she is a
CSE Alumni by profession she has the uncanny ability to come
up with suggestions that make me feel “Oh, why didn’t it
occur to me”. And finally my heartfelt gratitude to the
countless students who made me look into every nook and
cranny of Java. I would forever remain indebted to them.
 Introduction

This textbook was written with two primary objectives. The first
is to introduce the Java programming language. Java is a
practical and still-current software tool; it remains one of the
most popular programming languages in existence, particularly
in areas such as embedded systems. Java facilitates writing
code that is very efficient and powerful and, given the ubiquity
of Java compilers, can be easily ported to many different
platforms. Also, there is an enormous code-base of Java
programs developed, and many systems that will need to be
maintained and extended for many years to come. The second
key objective is to introduce the basic concepts of OOPs. At
one-level this is Java-specific: to learn to design, code and
debug complete Java programs. At another level, it is more
general: to learn the necessary skills to design large and
complex OOP systems. This involves learning to decompose
large problems into manageable systems of modules; to use
modularity and clean interfaces to design for correctness, clarity
and flexibility.
 Module I
Introduction to Java Programming
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observation? I could imagine no object for such a proceeding. But
Thorndyke’s methods were so unlike those of the police or of any
one else that it was idle to speculate on what he might do; and his
emphatic advice to Miller showed that he regarded Wallingford at
least with some interest.
“Well, Barbara,” I said, mentally postponing the problem for
future consideration, “let us forget Wallingford and everybody else.
What are we going to do this afternoon? Is there a matinée that we
could go to, or shall we go and hear some music?”
“No, Rupert,” she replied. “I don’t want any theatres or music. I
can have those when you are not here. Let us go and walk about
Kensington Gardens and gossip as we used to in the old days. But
we have a little business to discuss first. Let us get that finished and
then we can put it away and be free. You were going to advise me
about the house in Hilborough Square. My own feeling is that I
should like to sell it and have done with it once for all.”
“I shouldn’t do that, Barbara,” said I. “It is a valuable property,
but just at present its value is depreciated. It would be difficult to
dispose of at anything like a reasonable price until recent events
have been forgotten. The better plan would be to let it at a low rent
for a year or two.”
“But would anybody take it?”
“Undoubtedly, if the rent were low enough. Leave it to Brodribb
and me to manage. You needn’t come into the matter at all beyond
signing the lease. Is the house in fairly good repair?”
“Most of it is, but there are one or two rooms that will need
redecorating, particularly poor Harold’s. That had to be left when the
other rooms were done because he refused to be disturbed. It is in a
very dilapidated state. The paint is dreadfully shabby and the paper
is positively dropping off the walls in places. I daresay you
remember its condition.”
“I do, very well, seeing that I helped Madeline to paste some of
the loose pieces back in their places. But we needn’t go into details
now. I will go and look over the house and see what is absolutely
necessary to make the place presentable. Who has the keys?”
“I have the latch-keys. The other keys are inside the house.”
 “And I suppose you don’t wish to inspect the place yourself?”
“No. I do not. I wish never to set eyes upon that house again.”
She unlocked a little bureau, and taking a bunch of latch-keys
from one of the drawers handed it to me. Then she went away to
put on her out-door clothes.
Left alone in the room, I sauntered round and inspected
Barbara’s new abode, noting how, already, it seemed to reflect in
some indefinable way the personality of the tenant. It is this
sympathetic quality in human dwelling-places which gives its special
charm and interest to a room in which some person of character has
lived and worked, and which, conversely, imparts such deadly
dulness to the “best room” in which no one is suffered to distribute
the friendly, humanizing litter, and which is jealously preserved, with
all its lifeless ornamentation—its unenjoyed pictures and its unread
books—intact and undefiled by any traces of human occupation. The
furniture of this room was mostly familiar to me, for it was that of
the old boudoir. There was the little piano, the two cosy armchairs,
the open book-shelves with their array of well-used books, the
water-colours on the walls, and above the chimney-piece, the little
portrait of Stella with the thin plait of golden hair bordering the
frame.
I halted before it and gazed at the beloved face which seemed to
look out at me with such friendly recognition, and let my thoughts
drift back into the pleasant old times and stray into those that might
have been if death had mercifully passed by this sweet maid and left
me the one companion that my heart yearned for. Now that time
had softened my passionate grief into a tender regret, I could think
of her with a sort of quiet detachment that was not without its
bitter-sweet pleasure. I could let myself speculate on what my life
might have been if she had lived, and what part she would have
played in it; questions that, strangely enough, had never arisen
while she was alive.
I was so immersed in my reverie that I did not hear Barbara
come into the room, and the first intimation that I had of her
presence was when I felt her hand slip quietly into mine. I turned to
look at her and met her eyes, brimming with tears, fixed on me with
an expression of such unutterable sadness that, in a moment, my
heart leaped out to her, borne on a wave of sympathy and pity which
swept away all my caution and reserve. Forgetful of everything but
her loneliness and the grief which we shared, I drew her to me and
kissed her. It seemed the natural thing to do and I felt that she
understood, though she flushed warmly and the tears started from
her eyes so that she must needs wipe them away. Then she looked
at me with the faintest, most pathetic little smile and without a
word, we turned together and walked out of the room.
Barbara was, as I have said, a rather inscrutable and extremely
self-contained woman, but she could be, on occasions, a very
delightful companion. And so I found her to-day. At first a little
pensive and silent, she presently warmed up into a quite unwonted
gaiety and chatted so pleasantly and made so evident her pleasure
at having me back that I yearned no more for the Bar Mess but was
able to forget the horrors and anxieties of the past and give myself
up to the very agreeable present.
I have seldom spent a more enjoyable afternoon. Late autumn as
it was, the day was mild and sunny, the sky of that wonderful tender,
misty blue that is the peculiar glory of London. And the gardens, too,
though they were beginning to take on their winter garb, had not
yet quite lost their autumnal charm. Still, on the noble elms, thin as
their raiment was growing, the golden and russet foliage lingered,
and the leaves that they had already shed remained to clothe the
earth with a many-coloured carpet.
We had crossed the gardens by some of the wider paths and had
turned into one of the pleasant by-paths when Barbara, spying a
seat set back between a couple of elms, suggested that we should
rest for a few minutes before recrossing the gardens to go forth in
search of tea. Accordingly we sat down, sheltered on either side by
the great boles of the elms and warmed by the rays of the late
afternoon sun; but we had been seated hardly a minute when the
peace and forgetfulness that had made our ramble so delightful
were dissipated in a moment by an apparition on the wide path that
we had just left.
 I was the first to observe it. Glancing back through the interval
between the elm on my left and another at a little distance, I noticed
a man coming toward us. My attention was first drawn to him by his
rather singular behaviour. He seemed to be dividing his attention
between something that was ahead of him and something behind.
But I had taken no special note of him until I saw him step, with a
rather absurd air of secrecy and caution, behind a tree-trunk and
peer round it along the way that he had come. After keeping a look-
out in this fashion for nearly a minute, apparently without result, he
backed away from the tree and came forward at a quick pace,
peering eagerly ahead and on both sides and pausing now and again
to cast a quick look back over his shoulder. I drew Barbara’s
attention to him, remarking:
“There is a gentleman who seems to be afflicted with
Wallingford’s disease. He is trying to look all round the compass at
once.”
Barbara looked at the man, watching his movements for a time
with a faint smile. But suddenly the smile faded and she exclaimed:
“Why, I believe it is Tony! Yes, I am sure it is.”
And Tony it was. I recognized him almost as soon as she spoke.
He came on now at a quick pace and seemed in a hurry either to
escape from what he supposed to be behind him or to overtake
whatever was in front. He had apparently not seen us, for though
we must have been visible to him—or we could not have seen him—
we were rendered inconspicuous by the two trees between which we
sat. Presently he disappeared as the nearer elm-trunk hid him from
our view, and I waited with half-amused annoyance for him to
reappear.
“What a nuisance he is!” said Barbara. “Disturbing our peaceful
tête-à-tête. But he won’t freeze on to us. He would rather forego my
much desired society than put up with yours.” She laughed softly
and added in a thoughtful tone: “I wonder what he is doing here.”
I had been wondering that, myself. Kensington Gardens were
quite near to Barbara’s flat, but they were a long way from Jermyn
Street. It was certainly odd that he should be here and on this day
of all days. But at this point my reflections were interrupted by the
appearance of their subject from behind the big elm-trunk.
He came on us suddenly and was quite close before he saw us.
When he did see us, however, he stopped short within a few paces
of us, regarding us with a wild stare. It was the first time that I had
seen him since the funeral; and certainly his appearance had not
improved in the interval. There was something neglected and
dishevelled in his aspect that was distinctly suggestive of drink or
drugs. But what principally struck me was the expression of furious
hate with which he glared at me. There was no mistaking it.
Whatever might be the cause, there could be no doubt that he
regarded me with almost murderous animosity. He remained in this
posture only for a few seconds. Then, as Barbara had begun to utter
a few words of greeting, he raised his hat and strode away without a
word.
Barbara looked at his retreating figure with a vexed smile.
“Silly fellow!” she exclaimed. “He is angry that I have come out
to spend a few hours with my oldest friend, and shows it like a bad-
mannered child. I wish he would behave more like an ordinary
person.”
“You can hardly expect him to behave like what he is not,” I said.
“Besides, a very ordinary man may feel jealous at seeing another
man admitted to terms of intimacy, which are denied to him, with
the woman to whom he is specially attached. For I suppose,
Barbara, we may take it that that is the position?”
“I suppose so,” she admitted. “He is certainly very devoted to
me, and I am afraid he is rather jealous of you.”
As she spoke, I looked at her and could not but feel a faint
sympathy with Wallingford. She was really a very handsome woman;
and to-day she was not only looking her best; she seemed, in some
mysterious way to have grown younger, more girlish. The rather
sombre gravity of the last few years seemed to be quite dissipated
since we had left the flat, and much of the charm of her youth had
come back to her.
“He looked more than rather jealous,” said I. “Venomous hatred
was what I read in his face. Do you think he has anything against
me other than my position as his rival in your affections?”
“Yes, I do. He is mortally afraid of you. He believes that you
suspect him of having, at least had a hand in poor Harold’s death
and that you have set Dr. Thorndyke to track him down and bring
the crime home to him. And his terror of Dr. Thorndyke is positively
an insane obsession.”
I was by no means so sure of this, but I said nothing, and she
continued:
“I suppose you don’t know whether Dr. Thorndyke does really
look on him with any suspicion? To me the idea is preposterous.
Indeed, I find it impossible to believe that there was any crime at all.
I am convinced that poor Harold was the victim of some strange
accident.”
“I quite agree with you, Barbara. That is exactly my own view.
But I don’t think it is Thorndyke’s. As to whom he suspects—if he
suspects anybody—I have not the faintest idea. He is a most
extraordinarily close and secretive man. No one ever knows what is
in his mind until the very moment when he strikes. And he never
does strike until he has his case so complete that he can take it into
court with the certainty of getting a conviction, or an acquittal, as
the case may be.”
“But I suppose there are mysteries that elude even his skill?”
“No doubt there are; and I am not sure that our mystery is not
one of them. Even Thorndyke can’t create evidence, and as he
pointed out to me, the evidence in our case lies in the past and is
mostly irrecoverable.”
“I hope it is not entirely irrecoverable,” said she; “for until some
reasonable solution of the mystery is reached, an atmosphere of
suspicion will continue to hang about all the inmates of that house.
So let us wish Dr. Thorndyke his usual success; and when he has
proved that no one was guilty—which I am convinced is the fact—
perhaps poor Tony will forgive him.”
With this, we dismissed the subject, and, getting up from the
seat, made our way out of the gardens just as the sun was setting
behind the trees, and went in search of a suitable tea-shop. And
there we lingered gossiping until the evening was well advanced and
it was time for me to see Barbara home to her flat and betake
myself to Fig Tree Court and make some pretence of doing an
evening’s work.
 Chapter XII.
Thorndyke Challenges the Evidence
My relations with Thorndyke were rather peculiar and a little
inconsistent. I had commissioned him, somewhat against his
inclination, to investigate the circumstances connected with the
death of Harold Monkhouse. I was, in fact, his employer. And yet, in
a certain subtle sense, I was his antagonist. For I held certain beliefs
which I, half-unconsciously, looked to him to confirm. But apparently
he did not share those beliefs. As his employer, it was clearly my
duty to communicate to him any information which he might think
helpful or significant, even if I considered it irrelevant. He had, in
fact, explicitly pointed this out to me; and he had specially warned
me to refrain from sifting or selecting facts which might become
known to me according to my view of their possible bearing on the
case.
But yet this was precisely what I felt myself constantly tempted
to do; and as we sat at lunch in his chambers on the day after my
visit to Barbara, I found myself consciously suppressing certain facts
which had then come to my knowledge. And it was not that those
facts appeared to me insignificant. On the contrary, I found them
rather surprising. Only I had the feeling that they would probably
convey to Thorndyke a significance that would be erroneous and
misleading.
There was, for instance, the appearance of Wallingford in
Kensington Gardens. Could it have been sheer chance? If so, it was
a most remarkable coincidence; and one naturally tends to look
askance at remarkable coincidences. In fact, I did not believe it to
be a coincidence at all. I felt little doubt that Wallingford had been
lurking about the neighbourhood of Barbara’s flat and had followed
us, losing sight of us temporarily, when we turned into the by-path.
But, knowing Wallingford as I did, I attached no importance to the
incident. It was merely a freak of an unstable, emotional man
impelled by jealousy to make a fool of himself. Again, there was
Wallingford’s terror of Thorndyke and his ridiculous delusions on the
subject of the “shadowings.” How easy it would be for a person
unacquainted with Wallingford’s personality to read into them a
totally misleading significance! Those were the thoughts that drifted
half-consciously through my mind as I sat opposite my friend at the
table. So, not without some twinges of conscience, I held my peace.
But I had not allowed for Thorndyke’s uncanny capacity for
inferring what was passing in another person’s mind. Very soon it
became evident to me that he was fully alive to the possibility of
some reservations on my part; and when one or two discreet
questions had elicited some fact which I ought to have volunteered,
he proceeded to something like definite cross-examination.
“So the household has broken up and the inmates scattered?” he
began, when I had told him that I had obtained possession of the
keys. “And Mabel Withers seems to have vanished, unless the police
have kept her in view. Did you hear anything about Miss Norris?”
“Not very much. Barbara and she have exchanged visits once or
twice, but they don’t seem to see much of each other.”
“And what about Wallingford? Does he seem to have been much
disturbed by Miller’s descent on him?”
I had to admit that he was in a state bordering on panic.
“And what did Mrs. Monkhouse think of the forged orders on
Dimsdale’s headed paper?”
“He hadn’t disclosed that. She thinks that he bought the cocaine
at a druggist’s in the ordinary way, and I didn’t think it necessary to
undeceive her.”
“No. The least said the soonest mended. Did you gather that she
sees much of Wallingford?”
“Yes, rather too much. He was haunting her flat almost daily until
she gave him a hint not to make his visits too noticeable.”
“Why do you suppose he was haunting her flat? So far as you
can judge, Mayfield—that is in the strictest confidence, you
understand—does there seem to be anything between them beyond
ordinary friendliness?”
“Not on her side, certainly, but on his—yes, undoubtedly. His
devotion to her amounts almost to infatuation, and has for a long
time past. Of course, she realizes his condition, and though he is
rather a nuisance to her, she takes a very kindly and indulgent view
of his vagaries.”
“Naturally, as any well-disposed woman would. I suppose you
didn’t see anything of him yesterday?”
Of course I had to relate the meeting in Kensington Gardens, and
I could see by the way Thorndyke looked at me that he was
wondering why I had not mentioned the matter before.
“It almost looks,” said he, “as if he had followed you there. Was
there anything in his manner of approach that seemed to support
that idea?”
“I think there was, for I saw him at some distance,” and here I
felt bound to describe Wallingford’s peculiar tactics.
“But,” said Thorndyke, “why was he looking about behind him?
He must have known that you were in front.”
“It seems,” I explained, feebly, “that he has some ridiculous idea
that he is being watched and followed.”
“Ha!” said Thorndyke. “Now I wonder who he supposes is
watching and following him.”
“I fancy he suspects you,” I replied. And so the murder was out,
with the additional fact that I had not been very ready with my
information.
Thorndyke, however, made no comment on my reticence beyond
a steady and significant look at me.
“So,” said he, “he suspects me of suspecting him. Well, he is
giving us every chance. But I think, Mayfield, you would do well to
put Mrs. Monkhouse on her guard. If Wallingford makes a public
parade of his feelings towards her, he may put dangerous ideas into
the head of Mr. Superintendent Miller. You must realize that Miller is
looking for a motive for the assumed murder. And if it comes to his
knowledge that Harold Monkhouse’s secretary was in love with
Harold Monkhouse’s wife, he will think that he has found a motive
that is good enough.”
“Yes, that had occurred to me; and in fact, I did give her a hint
to that effect, but it was hardly necessary. She had seen it for
herself.”
As we now seemed to have exhausted this topic, I ventured to
make a few enquiries about the rather farcical infernal machine.
“Did your further examination of it,” I asked, “yield any new
information?”
“Very little,” Thorndyke replied, “but that little was rather curious.
There were no finger-prints at all. I examined both the pistol and the
jar most thoroughly, but there was not a trace of a finger-mark, to
say nothing of a print. It is impossible to avoid the conclusion that
the person who sent the machine wore gloves while he was putting
it together.”
“But isn’t that a rather natural precaution in these days?” I
asked.
“A perfectly natural precaution, in itself,” he replied, “but not
quite consistent with some other features. For instance, the wadding
with which the pistol-barrel was plugged consisted of a little ball of
knitting-wool of a rather characteristic green. I will show it to you,
and you will see that it would be quite easy to match and therefore
possible to trace. But you see that there are thus shown two
contrary states of mind. The gloves suggest that the sender
entertained the possibility that the machine might fail to explode,
whereas the wool seems to indicate that no such possibility was
considered.”
He rose from the table—lunch being now finished—and brought
from a locked cabinet a little ball of wool of a rather peculiar
greenish blue. I took it to the window and examined it carefully,
impressed by the curious inconsistency which he had pointed out.
“Yes,” I agreed, “there could be no difficulty in matching this. But
as to tracing it, that is a different matter. There must have been
thousands of skeins of this sold to, at least, hundreds of different
persons.”
 “Very true,” said he. “But I was thinking of it rather as a
corroborating item in a train of circumstantial evidence.”
He put the “corroborating item” back in the cabinet and as, at
this moment a taxi was heard to draw up at our entry, he picked up
a large attaché case and preceded me down the stairs.
During the comparatively short journey I made a few not very
successful efforts to discover what was Thorndyke’s real purpose in
making this visit of inspection to the dismantled house. But his
reticence and mine were not quite similar. He answered all my
questions freely. He gave me a wealth of instances illustrating the
valuable evidence obtained by the inspection of empty houses. But
none of them seemed to throw any light on his present proceedings.
And when I pointed this out, he smilingly replied that I was in
precisely the same position as himself.
“We are not looking for corroborative evidence,” said he. “That
belongs to a later stage of the inquiry. We are looking for some
suggestive fact which may give us a hint where to begin. Naturally
we cannot form any guess as to what kind of fact that might be.”
It was not a very illuminating answer, but I had to accept it,
although I had a strong suspicion that Thorndyke’s purpose was not
quite so vague as he represented it to be, and determined
unobtrusively to keep an eye on his proceedings.
“Can I give you any assistance?” I enquired, craftily, when I had
let him into the hall and shut the outer door.
“Yes,” he replied, “there is one thing that you can do for me
which will be very helpful. I have brought a packet of cards with
me”—here he produced from his pocket a packet of stationer’s post-
cards. “If you will write on each of them the description and
particulars of one room with the name of the occupant in the case of
bedrooms, and lay the card on the mantelpiece of the room which it
describes, I shall be able to reconstitute the house as it was when it
was inhabited. Then we can each go about our respective
businesses without hindering one another.”
I took the cards—and the fairly broad hint—and together we
made a preliminary tour of the house, which, now that the furniture,
carpets and pictures were gone, looked very desolate and forlorn;
and as it had not been cleaned since the removal, it had a
depressingly dirty and squalid appearance. Moreover, in each room,
a collection of rubbish and discarded odds and ends had been
roughly swept up on the hearth, converting each fireplace into a sort
of temporary dust-bin.
After a glance around the rooms on the ground floor, I made my
way up to the room in which Harold Monkhouse had died, which was
my principal concern as well as Thorndyke’s.
“Well, Mayfield,” the latter remarked, running a disparaging eye
round the faded, discoloured walls and the blackened ceiling, “you
will have to do something here. It is a shocking spectacle. Would
you mind roughly sketching out the position of the furniture? I see
that the bedstead stood by this wall with the head, I presume,
towards the window, and the bedside table about here, I suppose, at
his right hand. By the way, what was there on that table? Did he
keep a supply of food of any kind for use at night?”
“I think they usually put a little tin of sandwiches on the table
when the night preparations were made.”
“You say ‘they.’ Who put the box there?”
“I can’t say whose duty it was in particular. I imagine Barbara
would see to it when she was at home. In her absence it would be
done by Madeline or Mabel.”
“Not Wallingford?”
“No. I don’t think Wallingford ever troubled himself about any of
the domestic arrangements excepting those that concerned
Barbara.”
“Do you know who made the sandwiches?”
“I think Madeline did, as a rule. I know she did sometimes.”
“And as to drink? I suppose he had a water-bottle, at any rate.”
“Yes, that was always there, and a little decanter of whiskey. But
he hardly ever touched that. Very often a small flagon of lemonade
was put on the table with the sandwiches.”
“And who made the lemonade?”
“Madeline. I know that, because it was a very special brand
which no one else could make.”
 “And supposing the sandwiches and the lemonade were not
consumed, do you happen to know what became of the remainder?”
“I have no idea. Possibly the servants consumed them, but more
probably they were thrown away. Well-fed servants are not partial to
remainders from a sick-room.”
“You never heard of any attacks of illness among any of the
servants?”
“Not to my knowledge. But I shouldn’t be very likely to, you
know.”
“No. You notice, Mayfield, that you have mentioned one or two
rather material facts that were not disclosed at the inquest?”
“Yes. I was observing that. And it is just as well that they were
not disclosed. There were enough misleading facts without them.”
Thorndyke smiled indulgently. “You seem to have made up your
mind pretty definitely, on the negative side, at least,” he remarked;
and then, looking round once more at the walls with their faded,
loosened paper, he continued: “I take it that Mr. Monkhouse was not
a fresh-air enthusiast.”
“He was not,” I replied. “He didn’t much care for open windows,
especially at night. But how did you arrive at that fact?”
“I was looking at the wall-paper. This is not a damp house, but
yet the paper on the walls of this room is loosening and peeling off
in all directions. And if you notice the distribution of this tendency
you get the impression that the moisture which loosened the paper
proceeded from the neighbourhood of the bed. The wall which is
most affected is the one against which the bed stood; and the part
of that wall that has suffered most is that which was nearest to the
occupant of the bed, and especially to his head. That large piece,
hanging down, is just where the main stream of his breath would
have impinged.”
“Yes, I see the connection now you mention it; and yet I am
surprised that his breath alone should have made the air of the room
so damp. All through the winter season, when the window would be
shut most closely, the gas was burning; and at night, when the gas
was out, he commonly had his candle-lamp alight. I should have
thought that the gas and the candle together would have kept the
air fairly dry.”
“That,” said Thorndyke, “is a common delusion. As a matter of
fact they would have quite the opposite effect. You have only to hold
an inverted tumbler over a burning candle to realize, from the
moisture which immediately condenses on the inside of the tumbler,
that the candle, as it burns, gives off quite a considerable volume of
steam. But of course, the bulk of the moisture which has caused the
paper to peel in this room came from the man’s own breath.
However, we didn’t come here for debating purposes. Let us
complete our preliminary tour, and when we have seen the whole
house we can each make such more detailed inspection as seems
necessary for our particular purposes.”
We accordingly resumed our perambulation (but I noticed that
Thorndyke deposited his attaché case in Monkhouse’s room with the
evident intention of returning thither), both of us looking about
narrowly: Thorndyke, no doubt, in search of the mysterious “traces”
of which he had spoken, and I with an inquisitive endeavour to
ascertain what kind of objects or appearances he regarded as
“traces.”
We had not gone very far before we encountered an object that
even I was able to recognize as significant. It was in a corner of the
long corridor that we came upon a little heap of rubbish that had
been swept up out of the way; and at the very moment when
Thorndyke stopped short with his eyes fixed on it, I saw the object—
a little wisp of knitting-wool of the well-remembered green colour.
Thorndyke picked it up, and, having exhibited it to me, produced
from his letter-case a little envelope such as seedsmen use, in which
he put the treasure trove, and as he uncapped his fountain pen, he
looked up and down the corridor.
“Which is the nearest room to this spot?” he asked.
“Madeline’s,” I replied. “That is the door of her bedroom, on the
right. But all the principal bedrooms are on this floor and Barbara’s
boudoir as well. This heap of rubbish is probably the sweepings from
all the rooms.”
 “That is what it looks like,” he agreed as he wrote the particulars
on the envelope and slipped the latter in his letter-case. “You notice
that there are some other trifles in this heap—some broken glass, for
instance. But I will go through it when we have finished our tour,
though I may as well take this now.”
As he spoke, he stooped and picked up a short piece of rather
irregularly shaped glass rod with a swollen, rounded end.
“What is it?” I asked.
“It is a portion of a small glass pestle and it belongs to one of
those little glass mortars such as chemists use in rubbing up
powders into solutions or suspensions. You had better not touch it,
though it has probably been handled pretty freely. But I shall test it
on the chance of discovering what it was last used for.”
He put it away carefully in another seed-envelope and then
looked down thoughtfully at the miniature dust-heap; but he made
no further investigations at the moment and we resumed the
perambulation, I placing the identification card on the mantelpiece
of each room while he looked sharply about him, opening all
cupboards and receptacles and peering into their, usually empty,
interiors.
When we had inspected the servants’ bedrooms and the attics—
leaving the indispensable cards—we went down to the basement
and visited the kitchen, the scullery, the servants’ parlour and the
cellars; and this brought our tour to an end.
“Now,” said Thorndyke, “we proceed from the general to the
particular. While you are drawing up your schedule of dilapidations I
will just browse about and see if I can pick up any stray crumbs in
which inference can find nourishment. It isn’t a very hopeful quest,
but you observe that we have already lighted on two objects which
may have a meaning for us.”
“Yes, we have ascertained that some one in this house used a
particular kind of wool and that some one possessed a glass mortar.
Those do not seem to me very weighty facts.”
“They are not,” he agreed; “indeed, they are hardly facts at all.
The actual fact is that we have found the things here. But trifles light
as air sometimes serve to fill up the spaces in a train of
circumstantial evidence. I think I will go and have another look at
that rubbish-heap.”
I was strongly tempted to follow him, but could hardly do so in
face of his plainly expressed wish to make his inspection alone.
Moreover, I had already seen that there was more to be done than I
had supposed. The house was certainly not in bad repair, but neither
did it look very fresh nor attractive. Furniture and especially pictures
have a way of marking indelibly the walls of a room, and the
paintwork in several places showed disfiguring traces of wear. But I
was anxious to let this house, even at a nominal rent, so that, by a
few years’ normal occupation its sinister reputation might be
forgotten and its value restored.
As a result, I was committed to a detailed inspection of the whole
house and the making of voluminous notes on the repairs and re-
decorations which would be necessary to tempt even an
impecunious tenant to forget that this was a house in which a
murder had been committed. For that was the current view,
erroneous as I believed it to be. Note-book in hand, I proceeded
systematically from room to room and from floor to floor, and
became so engrossed with my own business that I almost forgot
Thorndyke; though I could hear him moving about the house, and
once I met him—on the first floor, with a couple of empty medicine
bottles and a small glass jar in his hands, apparently making his way
to Harold’s room, where, as I have said, he had left his attaché case.
That room I left to the last, as it was already entered in my list
and I did not wish to appear to spy upon Thorndyke’s proceedings.
When, at length, I entered the room I found that he, like myself, had
come to the end of his task. On the floor his attaché case lay open,
crammed with various objects, several of which appeared to be
bottles, wrapped in oddments of waste paper (including some pieces
of wall paper which he had apparently stripped off ad hoc when the
other supplies failed) and among which I observed a crumpled fly-
paper. Respecting this I remarked: “I don’t see why you are
burdening yourself with this. A fly-paper is in no sense an
incriminating object, even though such things have, at times, been
put to unlawful use.”
 “Very true,” he replied as he peeled off the rubber gloves which
he had been wearing during the search. “A fly-paper is a perfectly
normal domestic object. But, as you say, it can on occasion be used
as a source of arsenic for criminal purposes; and a paper that has
been so used will be found to have had practically the whole of the
arsenic soaked out of it. As I happened to find this in the servants’
parlour, it seemed worth while to take it to see whether its charge of
arsenic had or had not been extracted.”
“But,” I objected, “why on earth should the poisoner—if there
really is such a person—have been at the trouble of soaking out fly-
papers when, apparently he was able to command an unlimited
supply of Fowler’s Solution?”
“Quite a pertinent question, Mayfield,” he rejoined. “But may I
ask my learned friend whether he found the evidence relating to the
Fowler’s Solution perfectly satisfactory?”
“But surely!” I exclaimed. “You had the evidence of two expert
witnesses on the point. What more would you require? What is the
difficulty?”
“The difficulty is this. There were several witnesses who testified
that when they saw the bottle of medicine, the Fowler’s Solution had
not yet been added; but there was none who saw the bottle after
the addition had been made.”
“But it must have been added before Mabel gave the patient the
last dose.”
“That is the inference. But Mabel said nothing to that effect. She
was not asked what colour the medicine was when she gave the
patient that dose.”
“But what of the analysts and the post mortem?”
“As to the post mortem, the arsenic which was found in the
stomach was not recognized as being in the form of Fowler’s
Solution; and as to the analysts, they made their examination three
days after the man died.”
“Still, the medicine that they analysed was the medicine that
deceased had taken. You don’t deny that, do you?”
“I neither deny it nor affirm it. I merely say that no evidence was
given that proved the presence of Fowler’s Solution in that bottle
before the man died; and that the bottle which was handed to the
analysts was one that had been exposed for three days in a room
which had been visited by a number of persons, including Mrs.
Monkhouse, Wallingford, Miss Norris, Mabel Withers, Amos
Monkhouse, Dr. Dimsdale and yourself.”
“You mean to suggest that the bottle might have been tampered
with or changed for another? But, my dear Thorndyke, why in the
name of God should any one want to change the bottle?”
“I am not suggesting that the bottle actually was changed. I am
merely pointing out that the evidence of the analysts is material only
subject to the conditions that the bottle which they examined was
the bottle from which the last dose of medicine was given and that
its contents were the same as on that occasion; and that no
conclusive proof exists that it was the same bottle or that the
contents were unchanged.”
“But what reason could there be for supposing that it might have
been changed?”
“There is no need to advance any reason. The burden of proof
lies on those who affirm that it was the same bottle with the same
contents. It is for them to prove that no change was possible. But
obviously a change was possible.”
“But still,” I persisted, “there seems to be no point in this
suggestion. Who could have had any motive for making a change?
And what could the motive have been? It looks to me like mere
logic-chopping and hair-splitting.”
“You wouldn’t say that if you were for the defence,” chuckled
Thorndyke. “You would not let a point of first-rate importance pass
on a mere assumption, no matter how probable. And as to a
possible motive, surely a most obvious one is staring us in the face.
Supposing some person in this household had been administering
arsenic in the food. If it could be arranged that a poisonous dose
could be discovered in the medicine, you must see that the issue
would be at once transferred from the food to the medicine, and
from those who controlled the food to those who controlled the
medicine. Which is, in fact, what happened. As soon as the jury
heard about the medicine, their interest in the food became extinct.”
 I listened to this exposition with a slightly sceptical smile. It was
all very ingenious but I found it utterly unconvincing.
“You ought to be pleading in court, Thorndyke,” I said, “instead
of grubbing about in empty houses and raking over rubbish-heaps.
By the way, have you found anything that seems likely to yield any
suggestions?”
“It is a little difficult to say,” he replied. “I have taken possession
of a number of bottles and small jars for examination as to their
contents, but I have no great expectation in respect of them. I also
found some fragments of the glass mortar—an eight-ounce mortar it
appears to have been.”
“Where did you find those?” I asked.
“In Miss Norris’s bedroom, in a little pile of rubbish under the
grate. They are only tiny fragments, but the curvature enables one
to reconstruct the vessel pretty accurately.”
It seemed to me a rather futile proceeding, but I made no
comment. Nor did I give utterance to a suspicion which had just
flashed into my mind, that it was the discovery of these ridiculous
fragments of glass that had set my learned friend splitting straws on
the subject of the medicine bottle. I had not much liked his
suggestion as to the possible motive of that hypothetical
substitution, and I liked it less now that he had discovered the
remains of the mortar in Madeline’s room. There was no doubt that
Thorndyke had a remarkable constructive imagination; and, as I
followed him down the stairs and out into the square, I found myself
faintly uneasy lest that lively imagination should carry him into
deeper waters than I was prepared to navigate in his company.
 Chapter XIII.
Rupert Makes Some Discoveries
By a sort of tacit understanding Thorndyke and I parted in the
vicinity of South Kensington Station, to which he had made a bee
line on leaving the square. As he had made no suggestion that I
should go back with him, I inferred that he had planned a busy
evening examining and testing the odds and ends that he had picked
up in the empty house; while I had suddenly conceived the idea that
I might as well take the opportunity of calling on Madeline, who
might feel neglected if I failed to put in an appearance within a
reasonable time after my return to town. Our researches had taken
up most of the afternoon and it was getting on for the hour at which
Madeline usually left the school; and as the latter was less than half-
an-hour’s walk from the station, I could reach it in good time without
hurrying.
As I walked at an easy pace through the busily populated streets,
I turned over the events of the afternoon with rather mixed feelings.
In spite of my great confidence in Thorndyke, I was sensible of a
chill of disappointment in respect alike of his words and his deeds. In
this rather farcical grubbing about in the dismantled house there was
a faint suggestion of charlatanism; of the vulgar, melodramatic
sleuth, nosing out a trail; while, as to his hair-splitting objections to
a piece of straightforward evidence, they seemed to me to be of the
kind at which the usual hard-headed judge would shake his hard
head while grudgingly allowing them as technically admissible.
But whither was Thorndyke drifting? Evidently he had turned a
dubious eye on Wallingford; and that egregious ass seemed to be
doing all that he could to attract further notice. But to-day I had
seemed to detect a note of suspicion in regard to Madeline; and
even making allowance for the fact that he had not my knowledge of
her gentle, gracious personality, I could not but feel a little resentful.
Once more, Wallingford’s remarks concerning a possible mare’s nest
and a public scandal recurred to me, and, not for the first time, I
was aware of faint misgivings as to my wisdom in having set
Thorndyke to stir up these troubled waters. He had, indeed, given
me fair warning, and I was half-inclined to regret that I had not
allowed myself to be warned off. Of course, Thorndyke was much
too old a hand to launch a half-prepared prosecution into the air. But
still, I could not but ask myself uneasily whither his overacute
inferences were leading him.
These reflections brought me to the gate of the school, where I
learned from the porter that Madeline had not yet left and
accordingly sent up my card. In less than a minute she appeared,
dressed in her out-of-door clothes and wreathed in smiles, looking, I
thought, very charming.
“How nice of you, Rupert!” she exclaimed, “to come and take me
home. I was wondering how soon you would come to see my little
spinster lair. It is only a few minutes’ walk from here. But I am sorry
I didn’t know you were coming, for I have arranged to make a call—
a business call—and I am due in about ten minutes. Isn’t it a
nuisance?”
“How long will you have to stay?”
“Oh, a quarter of an hour, at least. Perhaps a little more.”
“Very well. I will wait outside for you and do sentry-go.”
“No, you won’t. I shall let you into my flat—I should have to pass
it—and you can have a wash and brush-up, and then you can prowl
about and see how you like my little mansion—I haven’t quite settled
down in it yet, but you must overlook that. By the time you have
inspected everything, I shall be back and then we can consider
whether we will have a late tea or an early supper. This is the way.”
She led me into a quiet by-street, one side of which was
occupied by a range of tall, rather forbidding buildings whose
barrack-like aspect was to some extent mitigated by signs of civilized
humanity in the tastefully curtained windows. Madeline’s residence
was on the second floor, and when she had let me in by the
diminutive outer door and switched on the light, she turned back to
the staircase with a wave of her hand.
“I will be back as soon as I can,” she said. “Meanwhile go in and
make yourself at home.”
I stood at the door and watched her trip lightly down the stairs
until she disappeared round the angle, when I shut the door and
proceeded to follow her injunctions to the letter by taking possession
of the bathroom, in which I was gratified to find a constant supply of
hot water. When I had refreshed myself by a wash, I went forth and
made a leisurely survey of the little flat. It was all very characteristic
of Madeline, the professional exponent of Domestic Economy, in its
orderly arrangement and its evidences of considered convenience.
The tiny kitchen reminded one of a chemical laboratory or a doctor’s
dispensary with its labelled jars of the cook’s materials set out in
ordered rows on their shelves, and the two little mortars, one of
Wedgewood ware and the other of glass. I grinned as my eye
lighted on this latter and I thought of the fragments carefully
collected by Thorndyke and solemnly transported to the Temple for
examination. Here, if he could have seen it, was evidence that
proved the ownership of that other mortar and at the same time
demolished the significance of that discovery.
I ventured to inspect the bedroom, and a very trim, pleasant little
room it was; but the feature which principally attracted my attention
was an arrangement for switching the electric light off and on from
the bed—an arrangement suspiciously correlated to a small set of
bookshelves also within easy reach of the bed. What interested me
in it was what Thorndyke would have called its “unmechanical
ingenuity”; for it consisted of no more than a couple of lengths of
stout string, of each of which one end was tied to the light-switch
and the other end led by a pair of screw-eyes to the head of the
bed. No doubt the simple device worked well enough in spite of the
friction at each screw-eye, but a man of less intelligence than
Madeline would probably have used levers or bell-cranks, or at least
pulleys to diminish the friction in changing the direction of the pull.
There was a second bedroom, at present unoccupied and only
partially furnished and serving, apparently, as a receptacle for such
of Madeline’s possessions as had not yet had a permanent place
assigned to them. Here were one or two chairs, some piles of books,
a number of pictures and several polished wood boxes and cases of
various sizes; evidently the residue of the goods and chattels that
Madeline had brought from her home and stored somewhere while
she was living at Hilborough Square. I ran my eye along the range of
boxes, which were set out on the top of a chest of drawers. One was
an old-fashioned tea-caddy, another an obvious folding desk of the
same period, while a third, which I opened, turned out to be a work-
box of mid-Victorian age. Beside it was a little flat rosewood case
which looked like a small case of mathematical instruments.
Observing that the key was in the lock, I turned it and lifted the lid,
not with any conscious curiosity as to what was inside it, but in the
mere idleness of a man who has nothing in particular to do. But the
instant that the lid was up my attention awoke with a bound and I
stood with dropped jaw staring at the interior in utter consternation.
There could be not an instant’s doubt as to what this case was,
for its green-baize-lined interior showed a shaped recess of the
exact form of a pocket pistol; and, if that were not enough, there, in
its own compartment was a little copper powder-flask, and in
another compartment about a dozen globular bullets.
I snapped down the lid and turned the key and walked guiltily
out of the room. My interest in Madeline’s flat was dead. I could
think of nothing but this amazing discovery. And the more I thought,
the more overpowering did it become. The pistol that fitted that case
was the exact counterpart of the pistol that I had seen in
Thorndyke’s laboratory; and the case, itself, corresponded exactly to
his description of the case from which that pistol had probably been
taken. It was astounding; and it was profoundly disturbing. For it
admitted of no explanation that I could bring myself to accept other
than that of a coincidence. And coincidences are unsatisfactory
things; and you can’t do with too many of them at once.
Yet, on reflection, this was the view that I adopted. Indeed, there
was no thinkable alternative. And really, when I came to turn the
matter over, it was not quite so extraordinary as it had seemed at
the first glance. For what, after all, was this pistol with its case? It
was not a unique thing. It was not even a rare thing. Thorndyke had
spoken of these pistols and cases as comparatively common things
with which he expected me to be familiar. Thousands of them must
have been made in their time, and since they were far from
perishable, thousands of them must still exist. The singularity of the
coincidence was not in the facts; it was the product of my own state
of mind.
Thus I sought—none too successfully—to rid myself of the effects
of the shock that I had received on raising the lid of the case; and I
was still moodily gazing out of the sitting room window and arguing
away my perturbation when I heard the outer door shut and a
moment later Madeline looked into the room.
“I haven’t been so very long, have I?” she said, cheerily. “Now I
will slip off my cloak and hat and we will consider what sort of meal
we will have; or perhaps you will consider the question while I am
gone.”
With this she flitted away; and my thoughts, passing by the
problem submitted, involuntarily reverted to the little rosewood case
in the spare room. But her absence was of a brevity suggesting the
performance of the professional quick-change artist. In a minute or
two I heard her approach and open the door; and I turned—to
receive a real knock-out blow.
I was so astonished and dismayed that I suppose I must have
stood staring like a fool, for she asked in a rather disconcerted tone:
“What is the matter, Rupert? Why are you looking at my jumper
like that? Don’t you like it?”
“Yes,” I stammered, “of course I do. Most certainly. Very
charming. Very—er—becoming. I like it—er—exceedingly.”
“I don’t believe you do,” she said, doubtfully, “you looked so
surprised when I first came in. You don’t think the colour too
startling, do you? Women wear brighter colours than they used to,
you know, and I do think this particular shade of green is rather
nice. And it is rather unusual, too.”
“It is,” I agreed, recovering myself by an effort. “Quite
distinctive.” And then, noting that I had unconsciously adopted
Thorndyke’s own expression, I added, hastily, “And I shouldn’t
describe it as startling, at all. It is in perfectly good taste.”
“I am glad you think that,” she said, “for you certainly did look
rather startled at first, and I had some slight misgivings about it
myself when I had finished it. It looked more brilliant in colour as a
garment than it did in the form of mere skeins.”
“You made it yourself, then?”
“Yes. But I don’t think I would ever knit another. It took me
months to do, and I could have bought one for very little more than
the cost of the wool, though, of course, I shouldn’t have been able
to select the exact tint that I wanted. But what about our meal?
Shall we call it tea or supper?”
She could have called it breakfast for all I cared, so completely
had this final shock extinguished my interest in food. But I had to
make some response to her eager hospitality.
“Let us split the difference or strike an average,” I replied. “We
will call it a ‘swarry’—tea and unusual trimmings.”
“Very well,” said she, “then you shall come to the kitchen and
help. I will show you the raw material of the feast and you shall
dictate the bill of fare.”
We accordingly adjourned to the kitchen where she fell to work
on the preparations with the unhurried quickness that is
characteristic of genuine efficiency, babbling pleasantly and pausing
now and then to ask my advice (which was usually foolish and had
to be blandly rejected) and treating the whole business with a sort
of playful seriousness that was very delightful. And all the time I
looked on in a state of mental chaos and bewilderment for which I
can find no words. There she was, my friend, Madeline, sweet,
gentle, feminine—the very type of gracious womanhood, and the
more sweet and gracious by reason of these homely surroundings.
For it is an appalling reflection, in these days of lady professors and
women legislators, that to masculine eyes a woman never looks so
dignified, so worshipful, so entirely desirable, as when she is
occupied in the traditional activities that millenniums of human
experience have associated with her sex. To me, Madeline, flitting
about the immaculate little kitchen, neat-handed, perfect in the
knowledge of her homely craft; smiling, dainty, fragile, with her
gracefully flowing hair and the little apron that she had slipped on as
a sort of ceremonial garment, was a veritable epitome of feminine
charm. And yet, but a few feet away was a rosewood case that had
once held a pistol; and even now, in Thorndyke’s locked cabinet—
but my mind staggered under the effort of thought and refused the
attempt to combine and collate a set of images so discordant.
“You are very quiet, Rupert,” she said, presently, pausing to look
at me. “What is it? I hope you haven’t any special worries.”
“We all have our little worries, Madeline,” I replied, vaguely.
“Yes, indeed,” said she, still regarding me thoughtfully; and for
the first time I noticed that she seemed to have aged a little since I
had last seen her and that her face, in repose, showed traces of
strain and anxiety. “We all have our troubles and we all try to put
them on you. How did you think Barbara was looking?”
“Extraordinarily well. I was agreeably surprised.”
“Yes. She is wonderful. I am full of admiration of the way she has
put away everything connected with—with that dreadful affair. I
couldn’t have done it if I had been in her place. I couldn’t have let
things rest. I should have wanted to know.”
“I have no doubt that she does. We all want to know. But she
can do no more than the rest of us. Do you ever see Wallingford
now?”
“Oh, dear, yes. He was inclined to be rather too attentive at first,
but Barbara gave him a hint that spinsters who live alone don’t want
too many visits from their male friends, so now he usually comes
with her.”
“I must bear Barbara’s words of wisdom in mind,” said I.
“Indeed you won’t!” she exclaimed. “Don’t be ridiculous, Rupert.
You know her hint doesn’t apply to you. And I shouldn’t have
troubled about the proprieties in Tony’s case if I had really wanted
him. But I didn’t, though I am awfully sorry for him.”
“Yes, he seems to be in a bad way mentally, poor devil. Of course
you have heard about his delusions?”
“If they really are delusions, but I am not at all sure that they
are. Now help me to carry these things into the sitting room and
then I will do the omelette and bring it in.”
I obediently took up the tray and followed her into the sitting
room, where I completed the arrangement of the table while she
returned to the kitchen to perform the crowning culinary feat. In a
minute or two she came in with the product under a heated cover
and we took our seats at the table.
“You were speaking of Wallingford,” said I. “Apparently you know
more about him than I do. It seemed to me that he was stark mad.”
“He is queer enough, I must admit—don’t let your omelette get
cold—but I think you and Barbara are mistaken about his delusions.
I suspect that somebody is really keeping him under observation;
and if that is so, one can easily understand why his nerves are so
upset.”
“Yes, indeed. But when you say you suspect that we are
mistaken, what does that mean? Is it just a pious opinion or have
you something to go upon?”
“Oh, I shouldn’t offer a mere pious opinion to a learned counsel,”
she replied, with a smile. “I have something to go upon, and I will
tell you about it, though I expect you will think I am stark mad, too.
The fact is that I have been under observation, too.”
“Nonsense, Madeline,” I exclaimed. “The thing is absurd. You
have let Wallingford infect you.”
“There!” she retorted. “What did I say? You think I am qualifying
for an asylum now. But I am not. Absurd as the thing seems—and I
quite agree with you on that point—it is an actual fact. I haven’t the
slightest doubt about it.”
“Well,” I said, “I am open to conviction. But let us have your
actual facts. How long do you think it has been going on?”
“That I can’t say; and I don’t think it is going on now at all. At
any rate, I have seen no signs of any watcher for more than a week,
and I keep a pretty sharp lookout. The way I first became aware of
it was this: I happened one day at lunch time to be looking out of
this window through the chink in the curtains when I saw a man
pass along slowly on the other side of the street and glance up, as it
seemed, at this window. I didn’t notice him particularly, but still I did
look at him when he glanced up, and of course, his face was then
directly towards me. Now it happened that, a few minutes
afterwards, I looked out again; and then I saw what looked like the
same man pass along again, at the same slow pace and in the same
direction. And again he looked up at the window, though he couldn’t
have seen me because I was hidden by the curtain. But this time I
looked at him very closely and made careful mental notes of his
clothing, his hat and his features, because, you see, I remembered
what Tony had said and I hadn’t forgotten the way I was treated at
the inquest or the way in which that detective man had turned out
my cupboard when he came to search the house. So I looked this
man over very carefully indeed so that I should recognize him
without any doubt if I should see him again.
“Well, before I went out after lunch I had a good look out of the
window, but I couldn’t see anything of him; nor did I see him on my
way to the school, though I stopped once or twice and looked back.
When I got to the school I stopped at the gate and looked along the
street both ways, but still there was no sign of him. Then I ran up to
a class-room window from which I could see up and down the
street; and presently I saw him coming along slowly on the school
side and I was able to check him off point by point, and though he
didn’t look up this time, I could see his face and check that off, too.
There was no doubt whatever that it was the same man.
“When I came out of school that afternoon I looked round but
could not see him, so I walked away quickly in the direction that I
usually take when going home, but suddenly turned a corner and
slipped into a shop. I stayed there a few minutes buying some
things, then I came out, and, seeing no one, slipped round the
corner and took my usual way home but kept carefully behind a man
and a woman who were going the same way. I hadn’t gone very far
before I saw my man standing before a shop window but evidently
looking up and down the street. I was quite close to him before he
saw me and of course I did not appear to notice him; but I hurried
home without looking round and ran straight up to this window to
watch for him. And sure enough, in about a couple of minutes I saw
him come down the street and walk slowly past.”
“And did you see him again after that?”
 “Yes, I saw him twice more that same day. I went out for a walk
in the evening on purpose to give him a lead. And I saw him from
time to time every day for about ten days. Then I missed him, and I
haven’t seen a sign of him for more than a week. I suppose he
found me too monotonous and gave me up.”
“It is very extraordinary,” I said, convinced against my will by her
very circumstantial description. “What possible object could any one
have in keeping a watch on you?”
“That is what I have wondered,” said she. “But I suppose the
police have to do something for their pay.”
“But this doesn’t quite look like a police proceeding. There is
something rather feeble and amateurish about the affair. With all
due respect to your powers of observation, Madeline, I don’t think a
Scotland Yard man would have let himself be spotted quite so
easily.”
“But who else could it be?” she objected; and then, after a
pause, she added with a mischievous smile, “unless it should be your
friend, Dr. Thorndyke. That would really be a quaint situation—if I
should, after all, be indebted to you, Rupert, for these polite
attentions.”
I brushed the suggestion aside hastily but with no conviction.
And once more I recalled Wallingford’s observations on mare’s nests.
Obviously this clumsy booby was not a professional detective. And if
not, what could he be but some hired agent of Thorndyke’s. It was
one more perplexity, and added to those with which my mind was
already charged, it reduced me to moody silence which must have
made me the very reverse of an exhilarating companion. Indeed,
when Madeline had rallied me once or twice on my gloomy
preoccupation, I felt that the position was becoming untenable. I
wanted to be alone and think things out; but as it would have been
hardly decent to break up our little party and take my departure, I
determined, if possible, to escape from this oppressive tête-à-tête.
Fortunately, I remembered that a famous pianist was giving a course
of recitals at a hall within easy walking distance and ventured to
suggest that we might go and hear him.