hat the doctor brought the stuff you
sent by him--brought it at once--and my darling is better--better."

Before Cleek could venture any reply to this, Captain Travers stalked
across the room and gripped his hand.

"And so you are that great man Cleek, are you?" he said. "Bully boy!
Bully boy! And to think that all the time it wasn't some mysterious
natural affliction; to think that it was crime--murder--poison. What
poison, man, what poison--what?"

"Ayupee, or, as it is variously called in the several islands of the
Eastern Archipelago, Pohon-Upas, Antjar, and Ipo," said Cleek, in reply.
"The deadly venom which the Malays use in poisoning the heads of their
arrows."

"What! that awful stuff!" said Mrs. Bawdrey, with a little shuddering
cry. "And someone in this house--" Her voice broke. She plucked at
Cleek's sleeve and looked up at him in an agony of entreaty. "Who?" she
implored. "Who in this house could? You said you would tell
to-night--you said you would. Oh, who could have the heart? Ah! Who? It
is true, if you have not heard it, that once upon a time there was bad
blood between Mr. Murdock and him--that Mr. Murdock is a family
connection; but even he, oh, even he--Tell me--tell me, Mr. Cleek!"

"Mrs. Bawdrey, I can't just yet," he made reply. "In my heart I am as
certain of it as though the criminal had confessed; but I am waiting for
a sign, and, until that comes, absolute proof is not possible. That it
will come, and may, indeed, come at any moment now that it is quite
dark, I am very certain. When it does--"

He stopped and threw up a warning hand. As he spoke a queer thudding
sound struck one dull note through the stillness of the house. He stood,
bent forward, listening, absolutely breathless; then, on the other side
of the wall, there rippled and rolled a something that was like the
sound of a struggle between two voiceless animals, and--the sign that he
awaited had come!

"Follow me--quickly, as noiselessly as you can. Let no one hear, let no
one see!" he said in a breath of excitement. Then he sprang cat-like to
the door, whirled it open, scudded round the angle of the passage to the
entrance of the room where the fraudulent collection was kept, and went
in with the silent fleetness of a panther. And a moment later, when
Captain Travers and Mrs. Bawdrey swung in through the door and joined
him, they came upon a horrifying sight.

For there, leaning against the open door of the case where the sk