pt
comfortably in the Hunterian Museum--other circumstances being
favorable; and even the gigantic skeleton of Corporal O'Brian--which
graces that collection--with that of his companion, the quaint little
dwarf, thrown in, would not have disturbed my rest in the smallest
degree. But this was different. I had the feeling, as I had had before,
that there was something queer about this museum of Challoner's.

I walked slowly along the great wall-case, looking in at the specimens;
and in the dull light, each seemed to look out at me as I passed with a
questioning expression in his shadowy eye-sockets, as if he would ask,
"Do you know who I was?" It made me quite uncomfortable.

There were twenty-five of them in all. Each stood on a small black
pedestal on which was painted in white a number and a date; excepting
one at the end, which had a scarlet pedestal and gold lettering. Number
1 bore the date 20th September, 1889, and Number 25 (the one with the
red pedestal) was dated 13th May, 1909. I looked at this last one
curiously; a massive figure with traces of great muscularity, a broad,
Mongoloid head with large cheekbones and square eye-sockets. A
formidable fellow he must have been; and even now, the broad, square
face grinned out savagely from the case.

I turned away with something of a shudder. I had not come here to get
"the creeps." I had come for Challoner's journal, or the "Museum
Archives" as he called it. The volumes were in the secret cupboard at
the end of the room and I had to take out the movable panel to get at
them. This presented no difficulty. I found the rosettes that moved the
catches and had the panel out in a twinkling. The cupboard was five feet
high by four broad and had a well in the bottom covered by a lid, which
I lifted and, to my amazement, found the cavity filled with revolvers,
automatic pistols, life-preservers, knuckle-dusters and other weapons,
each having a little label--bearing a number and a date--tied neatly on
it. I shut the lid down rather hastily; there was something rather
sinister in that collection of lethal appliances.

The volumes, seven in number, were on the top shelf, uniformly bound in
Russia leather and labeled, respectively, "Photographs,"
"Finger-prints," "Catalogue," and four volumes of "Museum Archives." I
was about to reach down the catalogue when my eye fell on the pile of
shallow boxes on the next shelf. I knew what they contained and recalled
uncomfortably the s