alked to us.

At first he treated the affair as of no importance. The medical
evidence had pronounced the Baron's death as having been due to
natural causes. The police could not interfere further, he declared.

"Ah! but thanks to the Baron's valet we now have evidence of a most
subtle and deadly poison," declared the Dutch pathologist. "I certify
that I have found upon a small piece of sharp steel, which has been
discovered in the dead man's glove, traces of orosin, one of the least
known but most dangerous poisons."

The heavy-jowled Dutch police official straightened himself in his
chair.

"Is that really so, doctor?" he asked in surprise, holding his cigar
between his fingers.

"Yes, it is," Doctor Obelt replied. "The body must be exhumed, and an
examination made to ascertain if there is a small cut in the first
finger of the left hand. If there is--then the Baron has been secretly
murdered!"

"The valet has alleged this all along, but there being no evidence we
disbelieved him," said the official at once.

"There is now evidence--direct evidence," said the Dutch doctor. "This
Englishman here is interested in some way in the Baron's death, and
after discovering the scrap of razor-blade he brought it to me."

The Dutch police official knit his brows, and turning to me, asked:

"Did you yourself discover this piece of steel?"

"I did. From certain facts within my knowledge I suspected that the
Baron had been deliberately killed. The allegations of the valet,
Folcker, strengthened my suspicions, hence I travelled from London and
pursued my own independent inquiries, which have resulted in the
discovery of the little piece of blade inside the glove which the
Baron wore when he went to interview his mysterious visitor at The
Hague."

"But what evidence have we that the mysterious visitor--the
individual who has been referred to in the report as the man with the
round horn glasses--had anything to do with the affair?"

"According to the Baron's servant the visitor was left alone for a few
moments in the room where van Veltrup had put down his gloves in order
to go out and speak to his valet, who on that day was acting as his
chauffeur. It was in those moments of his absence that the unknown
visitor put the infected scrap of steel into the Baron's glove."

"Did he not wear the gloves on his way back to Amsterdam?" asked the
police official, as he laid down his thin cigar.

"No," I replied. "The valet is c