Ludovic Travers' attention was attracted to the affair of the hanging at Frenchman's Rise by one curious feature — the man who had apparently committed suicide had been shaved after death! More curious still, Travers discovered that after reconstructing the dead man's beard he knew who the victim was. This brought him by devious ways to the musical theme with variations of the mysterious Mr. Rook, who bellowed at a woman who was not deaf and uttered certain strange cliches in his speech.