"Humph! do you think so?"

"It must be. He could not have come to the door without seeing him;
it's impossible."

"There is one thing not impossible, my dear fellow."

"What is that?"

"That you may have fallen asleep and dreamed the whole thing."

"Could I dream of a branch line that I had never heard of? Could
I dream of a hundred and one business details that had no kind of
interest for me? Could I dream of the seventy-five thousand pounds?"

"Perhaps you might have seen or heard some vague account of the
affair while you were abroad. It might have made no impression
upon you at the, and might have come back to you in your dreams,
recalled perhaps by the mere names of the stations on the line."

"What about the fire in the chimney of the blue room--should I have
heard of that during my journey?"

"Well, no; I admit there is a difficulty about that point."

"And what about the cigar-case?"

"Ay, by Jove! there is the cigar-case. That _is_ a stubborn
fact. Well, it's a mysterious affair, and it will need a better
detective than myself, I fancy, to clear it up. I suppose we may