ed man."

"Well, I can't say that I see anything remarkable in that. I've got nine
fingers myself, nine and one over, when it comes to that."

"No, you haven't, you duffer!" put in young Bawdrey, with a laugh.
"You've got eight fingers--eight fingers and two thumbs. This bony
johnny has nine fingers and two thumbs. That's what makes him a freak. I
say, dad, open the beggar's box, and let Rickaby see."

His father obeyed the request. Lifting the tiny brass latch which alone
secured it, he swung open the glazed door of the case, and, reaching in,
drew forward the flexible left arm of the skeleton.

"There you are," he said, supporting the bony hand upon his palm, so
that all its fingers were spread out and Cleek might get a clear view of
the monstrosity. "What a trial he must have been to the glove trade,
mustn't he?" laughing gaily. "Fancy the confusion and dismay, Mr.
Rickaby, if a fellow like this walked into a Bond Street shop in a hurry
and asked for a pair of gloves."

Cleek bent over and examined the thing with interest. At first glance,
the hand was no different from any other skeleton hand one might see any
day in any place where they sold anatomical specimens for the use of
members of the medical profession; but as Mr. Bawdrey, holding it on the
palm of his right hand, flattened it out with the fingers of his left,
the abnormality at once became apparent. Springing from the base of the
fourth finger, a perfectly developed fifth appeared, curling inward
toward what had once been the palm of the hand, as though, in life, it
had been the owner's habit of screening it from observation by holding
it in that position. It was, however, perfectly flexible, and Mr.
Bawdrey had no difficulty in making it lie out flat after the manner of
its mates.

The sight was not inspiring--the freaks of mother Nature rarely are. No
one but a doctor would have cared to accept the thing as a gift, and no
one but a man as mad on the subject of curiosities and with as little
sense of discrimination as Mr. Bawdrey would have dreamt for a moment of
adding it to a collection.

"It's rather uncanny," said Cleek, who had no palate for the abnormal in
Nature. "For myself, I may frankly admit that I don't like things of
that sort about me."

"You are very much like my wife in that," responded the old man. "She
was of the opinion that the skeleton ought to have been destroyed or
else handed over to some anatomical museum. But--well, it i