“What should we hear that was suspicious in the Temple, sir?” demanded Mr. Cardlestone, angrily.  “I hope the Temple is free from that sort of thing, young Mr. Breton.  Your respected guardian and myself had a quiet evening on our usual peaceful pursuits, and when he went away all was as quiet as the grave, sir.  What may have gone on in the chambers above and around me I know not!  Fortunately, our walls are thick, sir—­substantial.  I say, sir, the man probably fell down and broke his neck.  What he was doing here, I do not presume to say.”

“Well, it’s guess, you know, Mr. Cardlestone,” remarked Breton, again winking at Spargo.  “But all that was found on this man was a scrap of paper on which my name and address were written.  That’s practically all that was known of him, except that he’d just arrived from Australia.”

Mr. Cardlestone suddenly turned on the young barrister with a sharp, acute glance.

“Eh?” he exclaimed.  “What’s this?  You say this man had your name and address on him, young Breton!—­yours?  And that he came from—­Australia?”

“That’s so,” answered Breton.  “That’s all that’s known.”

Mr. Cardlestone put aside his umbrella, produced a bandanna handkerchief of strong colours, and blew his nose in a reflective fashion.

“That’s a mysterious thing,” he observed.  “Um—­does Elphick know all that?”

Breton looked at Spargo as if he was asking him for an explanation of Mr. Cardlestone’s altered manner.  And Spargo took up the conversation.

“No,” he said.  “All that Mr. Elphick knows is that Mr. Ronald Breton’s name and address were on the scrap of paper found on the body.  Mr. Elphick”—­here Spargo paused and looked at Breton—­“Mr. Elphick,” he presently continued, slowly transferring his glance to the old barrister, “spoke of going to view the body.”

“Ah!” exclaimed Mr. Cardlestone, eagerly.  “It can be seen?  Then I’ll go and see it.  Where is it?”

Breton started.

“But—­my dear sir!” he said.  “Why?”

Mr. Cardlestone picked up his umbrella again.

“I feel a proper curiosity about a mystery which occurs at my very door,” he said.  “Also, I have known more than one man who went to Australia.  This might—­I say might, young gentlemen—­might be a man I had once known.  Show me where this body is.”

Breton looked helplessly at Spargo:  it was plain that he did not understand the turn that things were taking.  But Spargo was quick to seize an opportunity.  In another minute he was conducting Mr. Cardlestone through the ins and outs of the Temple towards Blackfriars.  And as they turned into Tudor Street they encountered Mr. Elphick.

“I am going to the mortuary,” he remarked.  “So, I suppose, are you, Cardlestone?  Has anything more been discovered, young man?”

Spargo tried a chance shot—­at what he did not know.  “The man’s name was Marbury,” he said.  “He was from Australia.”