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ceased when we switched on the lights. But too late. He was dead.

"We never knew whether the impact of the table killed him, or whether he was dead before the table touched him. A medical certificate was made, giving heart failure as the cause: for the less said about such matters the better.

"I resumed possession of the table," continued the dealer, "but every night about 12, that table began its antics. That sort of thing went on for weeks, ever increasing in violence. I sold it to you, thinking that you—since you didn't know its history and your house was in no way connected with the foregoing events—might put a stop to such unbelievable performances."

"I see your line of thought," I replied, "but it didn't work out that way, unfortunately. And my house, thanks to your fraud, is a wreck. And fraud it is, for you represented it to be a table, and not a saber-toothed tiger.”

"Quite right, sir," he answered contritely. "And I assure you"

"By the way," interrupted Paul, "what brought you here at this time?"

"The police you told them of the table night before last. They naturally investigated my shop and questioned me about the table, thinking some collector had followed it from the shop to this house. So I knew it was up to its old tricks."

"Now," I queried, "what are you going to do with it? You've bought it back from me; so I can't follow my inclination to chop it up and burn it."

"Neither can I," declared the dealer. "For if I did, I'd feel I had assassinated Professor Percival. So I'll keep it chained up in a brightly lighted room."