I entered the club. It was just after eleven, and the big room was fairly full, though the rush had not yet set in. I noticed a tall, thin, angular man seated in an armchair by the fire. He turned as I drew my chair up to him. It was the man of all others whom I should have chosen⁠—Tarp Henry, of the staff of Nature , a thin, dry, leathery creature, who was full, to those who knew him, of kindly humanity. I plunged instantly into my subject.

“What do you know of Professor Challenger?”

“Challenger?” He gathered his brows in scientific disapproval. “Challenger was the man who came with some cock-and-bull story from South America.”

“What story?”