has visited the offices of
Colliers, the great railway contractors in Westminster--the firm who
constructed the railway in Peru. I recollect calling there with him in a
taxi one day."

Edwards smiled.

"He probably did that to impress you, sir," he replied. "They may have
known him as somebody else. Or he simply went in and made an inquiry.
He's evidently a very clever person."

Personally, I could not see how my friend could possibly have posed as
Sir Digby Kemsley if he were not, even though Edwards pointed out that
the real Sir Digby had only been in London a fortnight for the past nine
years.

Still, on viewing the whole situation, I confess inclination towards the
belief that my friend was, notwithstanding the allegations, the real Sir
Digby.

And yet those strange words of his, spoken in such confidence on the
previous night, recurred to me. There was mystery somewhere--a far more
obscure mystery even than what was apparent at that moment.

"Tell me what is known concerning Sir Digby's death in Peru," I asked.

"From the report furnished to us at the Yard it seems that one day last
August, while the gentleman in question was riding upon a trolley on the
Cerro de Pasco railway, the conveyance was accidentally overturned into a
river, and he was badly injured in the spine. A friend of his, a somewhat
mysterious Englishman named Cane, brought him down to the hospital at
Lima, and after two months there, he becoming convalescent, was conveyed
for fresh air to Huacho, on the sea. Here he lived with Cane in a small
bungalow in a somewhat retired spot, until on one night in February last
year something occurred--but exactly what, nobody is able to tell. Sir
Digby was found by his Peruvian servant dead from snake-bite. Cane
evinced the greatest distress and horror until, of a sudden, a second
man-servant declared that he had heard his master cry out in terror as he
lay helpless in his bed. He heard him shriek: 'You--you blackguard,
Cane--take the thing away! Ah! God! You've--you've killed me!' Cane
denied it, and proved that he was at a friend's house playing cards at
the hour when the servant heard his master shout for help. Next day,
however, he disappeared. Our Consul in Lima took up the matter, and in
due course a full report of the affair was forwarded to the Yard,
together with a very detailed description of the man wanted. This we sent
around the world, but up to to-day without result."

"Then the man Ca