“My name is Jerome,” he said simply. “Has something happened to Watson? Who are you?”
We were standing in the library; I made an indication towards the other room. “In there,” I said. “My name is Wendel.”
He took off his hat and ran the back of his hand across his forehead.
“So that pair got him, too! I was afraid of them all the while. And I had to be away. Do you know how they did it? What's the working of their game? It's devilish and certainly clever. They played that boy for a year; they knew they would get him in the end. So did I.
“He was a fine lad, a fine lad. I knew this morning when I came down from Nevada that they had him. Found your duds. A stranger. House looked queer. But I had hopes he might have gone over to see his girl. Just thought I'd wander over to Berkeley. Found that bird Rhamda under a palm tree watching the Holcomb bungalow. It was the first time I'd seen him since that day things went amiss with the professor. In about ten minutes you came out. I stayed with him while he tracked you back here; I followed him back down town and lost him. Tell me about Watson.”
He sat down; during my recital he spoke not a word. He consumed one cigar after another; when I stopped for a moment he merely nodded his head and waited until I continued. He was sturdy and frank, of an iron way and vast common sense. I liked him. When I had finished he remained silent; his grief was of a solid kind! he had liked poor Watson.
“I see,” he said. “It is as I thought. He told you more than he ever told me.”
“He never told you?”
“Not much. He was a strange lad—about the loneliest one I've ever seen. There was something about him from the very first that was not natural; I couldn't make him out. You say it is the ring. He always wore it. I laid it to this Rhamda. He was always meeting him. I could never understand it. Try as I would, I could not get a trace of the phantom.”
“The phantom?”