chummy with you of course, and you can lead him on and adroitly 'pump'
him regarding her, and where she keeps her keys and things like that.
That's the idea, isn't it?"

"Something of that sort. I'll find out all about her, never fear," said
Cleek in reply. Then they shook hands and parted, and it was not until
after young Bawdrey had gone that either he or Narkom recollected that
Cleek had overlooked telling the young man that Headland was not his
name.

"Oh, well, it doesn't matter. Time enough to tell him that when it comes
to making out the cheque," said Cleek, as the superintendent remarked
upon the circumstance. Then he pushed back his chair and walked over to
the window, and stood looking silently out upon the flowing river.
Narkom did not disturb his reflections. He knew from past experience, as
well as from the manner in which he took his lower lip between his teeth
and drummed with his finger-tips upon the window ledge, that some idea
relative to the working out of the case had taken shape within his mind,
and so, with the utmost discretion, went on with his tea and refrained
from speaking. Suddenly Cleek turned. "Mr. Narkom, do me a favour, will
you? Look me up a copy of Holman's 'Diseases of the Kidneys' when you go
back to town. I'll send Dollops round to the Yard to-night to get it."

"Right you are," said Narkom, taking out his pocket-book and making a
note of it. "But I say, look here, my dear fellow, you can't possibly
believe that it's anything of that sort, anything natural, I mean, in
the face of what we've heard?"

"No, I don't. I think it's something confoundedly unnatural, and that
that poor old chap is being secretly and barbarously murdered. I think
that--and--I think, too----" His voice trailed off. He stood silent and
preoccupied for a moment, and then, putting his thoughts into words,
without addressing them to anybody: "Ayupee!" he said reflectively;
"Pohon-Upas, Antjar, Galanga root, Ginger and Black Pepper--that's the
Javanese method of procedure, I believe. Ayupee!--yes, assuredly,
Ayupee!"

"What the dickens are you talking about, Cleek? And what does all that
gibberish and that word 'Ayupee' mean?"

"Nothing--nothing. At least, just yet. I say, put on your hat and let's
go for a pull on the river, Mr. Narkom. I've had enough of mysteries for
to-day and am spoiling for another hour in a boat."

Then he screwed round on his heel and walked out into the brilliant
summer sunshine.