about the kennels, and compare it with the same hound as, with
gleaming eyes and straining muscles, it runs upon a breast-high
scent--such was the change in Holmes since the morning. He was a
different man from the limp and lounging figure in the mouse-
coloured dressing-gown who had prowled so restlessly only a few
hours before round the fog-girt room.

"There is material here. There is scope," said he. "I am dull
indeed not to have understood its possibilities."

"Even now they are dark to me."

"The end is dark to me also, but I have hold of one idea which
may lead us far. The man met his death elsewhere, and his body
was on the ROOF of a carriage."

"On the roof!"

"Remarkable, is it not? But consider the facts. Is it a
coincidence that it is found at the very point where the train
pitches and sways as it comes round on the points? Is not that
the place where an object upon the roof might be expected to fall
off? The points would affect no object inside the train. Either
the body fell from the roof, or a very curious coincidence has
occurred. But now consider the question of the blood. Of
course, there was no bleeding on the line if the body had bled
elsewhere. Each fact is suggestive in itself. Together they
have a cumulative force."

"And the ticket, too!" I cried.