death in many forms, but never has it appeared to me in a more fearsome aspect

than in that dark grimy apartment, which looked out upon one of the main

arteries of suburban London.

 

Lestrade, lean and ferret-like as ever, was standing by the doorway, and greeted

my companion and myself.

 

“This case will make a stir, sir,” he remarked. “It beats anything I have seen,

and I am no chicken.”

 

“There is no clue?” said Gregson.

 

“None at all,” chimed in Lestrade.

 

Sherlock Holmes approached the body, and, kneeling down, examined it intently.

“You are sure that there is no wound?” he asked, pointing to numerous gouts and

splashes of blood which lay all round.

 

“Positive!” cried both detectives.

 

“Then, of course, this blood belongs to a second individual—presumably the

murderer, if murder has been committed. It reminds me of the circumstances

attendant on the death of Van Jansen, in Utrecht, in the year ‘34. Do you

remember the case, Gregson?”