“All at once?”

“No.  In separate parcels of twenty-five grammes each.”

“Is that all you know about Weiss?”

“It is all that I actually know; but it is not all that I suspect—­on very substantial grounds.  By the way, what did you think of the coachman?”

“I don’t know that I thought very much about him.  Why?”

“You never suspected that he and Weiss were one and the same person?”

“No.  How could they be?  They weren’t in the least alike.  And one was a Scotchman and the other a German.  But perhaps you know that they were the same?”

“I only know what you have told me.  But considering that you never saw them together, that the coachman was never available for messages or assistance when Weiss was with you; that Weiss always made his appearance some time after you arrived, and disappeared some time before you left; it has seemed to me that they might have been the same person.”

“I should say it was impossible.  They were so very different in appearance.  But supposing that they were the same; would the fact be of any importance?”

“It would mean that we could save ourselves the trouble of looking for the coachman.  And it would suggest some inferences, which will occur to you if you think the matter over.  But being only a speculative opinion, at present, it would not be safe to infer very much from it.”

“You have rather taken me by surprise,” I remarked.  “It seems that you have been working at this Kennington case, and working pretty actively I imagine, whereas I supposed that your entire attention was taken up by the Blackmore affair.”

“It doesn’t do,” he replied, “to allow one’s entire attention to be taken up by any one case.  I have half a dozen others—­minor cases, mostly—­to which I am attending at this moment.  Did you think I was proposing to keep you under lock and key indefinitely?”

“Well, no.  But I thought the Kennington case would have to wait its turn.  And I had no idea that you were in possession of enough facts to enable you to get any farther with it.”

“But you knew all the very striking facts of the case, and you saw the further evidence that we extracted from the empty house.”

“Do you mean those things that we picked out from the rubbish under the grate?”

“Yes.  You saw those curious little pieces of reed and the pair of spectacles.  They are lying in the top drawer of that cabinet at this moment, and I should recommend you to have another look at them.  To me they are most instructive.  The pieces of reed offered an extremely valuable suggestion, and the spectacles enabled me to test that suggestion and turn it into actual information.”

“Unfortunately,” said I, “the pieces of reed convey nothing to me.  I don’t know what they are or of what they have formed a part.”