He lit his pipe and fell to pacing the room with long strides, his eyes bent on the floor with an expression sternly reflective.  At last, finding him hopelessly taciturn, I knocked out my pipe and went to bed.

* * * * *

As I was dressing on the following morning, Thorndyke entered my room.  His face was grave even to sternness, and he held a telegram in his hand.

“I am going to Weybridge this morning,” he said shortly, holding the “flimsy” out to me.  “Shall you come?”

I took the paper from him, and read: 

     “Come, for God’s sake!  F. C. is dead.  You will
     understand.—­BRODRIBB.”

I handed him back the telegram, too much shocked for a moment to speak.  The whole dreadful tragedy summed up in that curt message rose before me in an instant, and a wave of deep pity swept over me at this miserable end to the sad, empty life.

“What an awful thing, Thorndyke!” I exclaimed at length.  “To be killed by a mere grotesque delusion.”

“Do you think so?” he asked dryly.  “Well, we shall see; but you will come?”

“Yes,” I replied; and as he retired, I proceeded hurriedly to finish dressing.

Half an hour later, as we rose from a rapid breakfast, Polton came into the room, carrying a small roll-up case of tools and a bunch of skeleton keys.

“Will you have them in a bag, sir?” he asked.

“No,” replied Thorndyke; “in my overcoat pocket.  Oh, and here is a note, Polton, which I want you to take round to Scotland Yard.  It is to the Assistant Commissioner, and you are to make sure that it is in the right hands before you leave.  And here is a telegram to Mr. Brodribb.”

He dropped the keys and the tool-case into his pocket, and we went down together to the waiting hansom.

At Weybridge Station we found Mr. Brodribb pacing the platform in a state of extreme dejection.  He brightened up somewhat when he saw us, and wrung our hands with emotional heartiness.

“It was very good of you both to come at a moment’s notice,” he said warmly, “and I feel your kindness very much.  You understood, of course, Thorndyke?”

“Yes,” Thorndyke replied.  “I suppose the mandarin beckoned to him.”

Mr. Brodribb turned with a look of surprise.  “How did you guess that?” he asked; and then, without waiting for a reply, he took from his pocket a note, which he handed to my colleague.  “The poor old fellow left this for me,” he said.  “The servant found it on his dressing-table.”

Thorndyke glanced through the note and passed it to me.  It consisted of but a few words, hurriedly written in a tremulous hand.

     “He has beckoned to me, and I must go.  Good-bye, dear old friend.”

“How does his cousin take the matter?” asked Thorndyke.