“What’s this?”
Analytical Chemist bends and whispers.
“ Who? ” Says Mortimer.
Analytical Chemist again bends and whispers.
Mortimer stares at him, and unfolds the paper. Reads it, reads it twice, turns it over to look at the blank outside, reads it a third time.
“This arrives in an extraordinarily opportune manner,” says Mortimer then, looking with an altered face round the table: “this is the conclusion of the story of the identical man.”
“Already married?” one guesses.
“Declines to marry?” another guesses.
“Codicil among the dust?” another guesses.
“Why, no,” says Mortimer; “remarkable thing, you are all wrong. The story is completer and rather more exciting than I supposed. Man’s drowned!”