the critic," he said with a sour smile, and lifted his
coffee cup to his lips slowly, and put it down very quickly. He had put
salt in it.

He looked at the vessel from which the silvery powder had come; it
was certainly a sugar-basin; as unmistakably meant for sugar as a
champagne-bottle for champagne. He wondered why they should keep salt in
it. He looked to see if there were any more orthodox vessels. Yes; there
were two salt-cellars quite full. Perhaps there was some speciality in
the condiment in the salt-cellars. He tasted it; it was sugar. Then he
looked round at the restaurant with a refreshed air of interest, to see
if there were any other traces of that singular artistic taste which
puts the sugar in the salt-cellars and the salt in the sugar-basin.
Except for an odd splash of some dark fluid on one of the white-papered
walls, the whole place appeared neat, cheerful and ordinary. He rang the
bell for the waiter.

When that official hurried up, fuzzy-haired and somewhat blear-eyed at
that early hour, the detective (who was not without an appreciation of
the simpler forms of humour) asked him to taste the sugar and see if
it was up to the high reputation of the hotel. The result was that the
waiter yawned suddenly and woke up.

"Do you play this delicate joke on your customers every morning?"
inquired Valentin. "Does changing the salt and sugar never pall on you
as a jest?"

The waiter, when this irony grew clearer, stammeringly assured him that
the establishment had certainly no such intention; it must be a most
curious mistake. He picked up the sugar-basin and looked at it; he
picked up the salt-cellar and looked at that, his face growing more and
more bewildered. At last he abruptly excused himself, and hurrying
away, returned in a few seconds with the proprietor. The proprietor also
examined the sugar-basin and then the salt-cellar; the proprietor also
looked bewildered.

Suddenly the waiter seemed to grow inarticulate with a rush of words.

"I zink," he stuttered eagerly, "I zink it is those two clergy-men."

"What two clergymen?"

"The two clergymen," said the waiter, "that threw soup at the wall."

"Threw soup at the wall?" repeated Valentin, feeling sure this must be
some singular Italian metaphor.

"Yes, yes," said the attendant excitedly, and pointed at the dark splash
on the white paper; "threw it over there on the wall."

Valentin looked his query at the proprietor, who came to his rescu