“The Old Testament in Russian and Yiddish,” he remarked, noting my surprise.  “I am going to get Polton to photograph a couple of specimen pages—­is that the postman or a visitor?”

It turned out to be the postman, and as Thorndyke extracted from the letter-box a blue official envelope, he glanced significantly at me.

“This answers your question, I think, Jervis,” said he.  “Yes; coroner’s subpoena and a very civil letter:  ’sorry to trouble you, but I had no choice under the circumstances’—­of course he hadn’t—­’Dr. Davidson has arranged to make the autopsy to-morrow at 4 p.m., and I should be glad if you could be present.  The mortuary is in Barker Street, next to the school.’  Well, we must go, I suppose, though Davidson will probably resent it.”  He took up the Testament, and went off with it to the laboratory.

We lunched at our chambers on the following day, and, after the meal, drew up our chairs to the fire and lit our pipes.  Thorndyke was evidently preoccupied, for he laid his open notebook on his knee, and, gazing meditatively into the fire, made occasional entries with his pencil as though he were arranging the points of an argument.  Assuming that the Aldgate murder was the subject of his cogitations, I ventured to ask: 

“Have you any material evidence to offer the coroner?”

He closed his notebook and put it away.  “The evidence that I have,” he said, “is material and important; but it is disjointed and rather inconclusive.  If I can join it up into a coherent whole, as I hope to do before I reach the court, it will be very important indeed—­but here is my invaluable familiar, with the instruments of research.”  He turned with a smile towards Polton, who had just entered the room, and master and man exchanged a friendly glance of mutual appreciation.  The relations of Thorndyke and his assistant were a constant delight to me:  on the one side, service, loyal and whole-hearted; on the other, frank and full recognition.

“I should think those will do, sir,” said Polton, handing his principal a small cardboard box such as playing-cards are carried in.  Thorndyke pulled off the lid, and I then saw that the box was fitted internally with grooves for plates, and contained two mounted photographs.  The latter were very singular productions indeed; they were copies each of a page of the Testament, one Russian and the other Yiddish; but the lettering appeared white on a black ground, of which it occupied only quite a small space in the middle, leaving a broad black margin.  Each photograph was mounted on a stiff card, and each card had a duplicate photograph pasted on the back.

Thorndyke exhibited them to me with a provoking smile, holding them daintily by their edges, before he slid them back into the grooves of their box.

“We are making a little digression into philology, you see,” he remarked, as he pocketed the box.  “But we must be off now, or we shall keep Davidson waiting.  Thank you, Polton.”