“Well, Jim?” he asked. “What’s the news at Little Farncombe—eh? You’ve been there several days; what have you discovered?”
“Several things,” replied the old crook who posed as servant. “Things we didn’t expect.”
“How?” asked Gray, offering the old man a cigarette from his gold case.
“Well, I went first to Pangbourne, and then to Little Farncombe. Young Homfray was taken queer again. I stayed at the Red Lion, and managed to find out all about what was going on at the Rectory. Homfray’s old gardener is in the habit of taking his glass of beer there at night, and I, posing as a stranger, soon got him to talk. He told me that his young master was taken ill in the night. His brain had given way, and the village doctor called in a specialist from Harley Street. The latter can’t make out the symptoms.”
“Probably not!” growled Gray. “The dose cost us a lot, so it ought not to be detected by the first man consulted.”
“The specialist has, however, fixed that he’s suffering from a drug—administered with malicious intent, he puts it.”
“What’s the fool’s name?” snapped Gray.
“I don’t know. My friend, the gardener, could not ascertain.”
Gray gave vent to a short grunt of dissatisfaction.
“Well—and what then?”