He sauntered over to the dresser, picked up a sheet of paper, smiled a little—not gaily. “My ‘suicide note’!” He looked at Young. “Funny sensation, reading your own farewell note. I bet not many experience it! Let’s see what I’m supposed to have said to myself. ‘I’m at the end of my rope. ‘Queer, how he hit the nail on the head that time! He made them short, always. So there wouldn’t be enough to them to give the handwriting away. He never signed them, either. Because he didn’t know their names. He didn’t even know what they looked like.”

Courlander’s voice sounded outside, talking it over with someone as he came toward the room. “. . . mattress and all! But instead of him landing on it, which might have saved his life, it landed on him. Didn’t do him a bit of good! He’s gone forever.”

Striker, leaning against the dresser, wasn’t recognized at first.

“Say, wait a minute, where have I seen you before?” the city dick growled finally, after he’d given a preliminary look around the disordered room.

“What a detective you turned out to be!” grunted the shaken Striker rudely.

“Oh, it’s you, is it? Do you haunt the place? What do you know about this?”

“A damn sight more than you!” was the uncomplimentary retort. “Sit down and learn some of it—or are you still afraid to face the real facts?”

Courlander sank back into a chair mechanically, mouth agape, staring at Striker.

“I’m not going to tell you about it,” Striker went on. “I’m going to demonstrate. That’s always the quickest way with kindergarten-age intelligences!” He caught at the overturned bed, righted it, rolled it almost effortlessly back into its original position against the side wall, foot facing directly toward the bathroom door.

“Notice that slight vibration, that humming the rubber-tired casters make across the floorboards? That’s the ‘distant thunder’ the Youngs heard that night. I’ll show you the lightning in just a minute. I’m going over there to his room now. Before I go, just let me point out one thing: the sleeper goes to bed in an unfamiliar room, and his last recollection is of the bathroom door being down there at the foot, the windows over here on this side. He wakes up dazedly in the middle of the night, starts to get out of bed, and comes up against the wall first of all. So then he gets out at the opposite side; but this has only succeeded in disorienting him, balling him up still further. All he’s still sure of, now, is that the bathroom door is somewhere down there at the foot of the bed! Now just watch closely and you’ll see the rest of it in pantomime. I’m going to show you just how it was done.”