The nerves of both comrades-in-arms were near snapping under that strain of motionless amiability, when Syme suddenly leant forward and idly tapped the edge of the table.

His message to his ally ran, "I have an intuition." The Professor, with scarcely a pause in his monologue, signalled back, "Then sit on it." Syme telegraphed, "It is quite extraordinary." The other answered, "Extraordinary rot!" Syme said, "I am a poet." The other retorted, "You are a dead man." Syme had gone quite red up to his yellow hair, and his eyes were burning feverishly.

As he said he had an intuition, and it had risen to a sort of lightheaded certainty.

Resuming his symbolic taps, he signalled to his friend, "You scarcely realise how poetic my intuition is.

It has that sudden quality we sometimes feel in the coming of spring." He then studied the answer on his friend's fingers.