named Heinrich Otto, who, unknown to the owner, was apparently trying to sub-let it furnished. Otto, who paid the rent regularly, had returned to Hamburg a year before, leaving the house in the hands of local agents, while Mr. Charlesworth resided somewhere down in Cornwall.
Herr Otto was described as a short, stout, fair-headed man of forty-five, who wore round, gold-rimmed spectacles. But even though the features of the suicide were so distorted, they could not have in any way resembled those of the German.
The mystery, though dismissed by police and public, was, to me, a most remarkable and interesting one, because I had established one amazing fact most clearly—a fact utterly unsuspected and yet astounding.
I had made a discovery, and saw that, if I exercised a constant vigil, I might possibly turn my knowledge to considerable monetary advantage.
You know, my dear Brown, that I'm in a chronic state of being hard-up. I was then. I wanted money, and I had devised a deep scheme to secure it.
Well, that night, and for a good many nights afterwards I haunted the Avenue Road.
