What do you make of that, Jervis ?" "It is very remarkable," I said, poring over the cards to verify Thorndyke's statements.

"I don't quite know what to make of it.

If the circumstances admitted of the idea of forgery, one would suspect the genuineness of some of the signatures.

But they don't--at any rate, in the case of the later will, to say nothing of Mr.Britton's opinion on the signatures." "Still," said Thorndyke, "there must be some explanation of the change in the character of the signatures, and that explanation cannot be the failing eyesight of the writer; for that is a gradually progressive and continuous condition, whereas the change in the writing is abrupt and intermittent." I considered Thorndyke's remark for a few moments; and then a light--though not a very brilliant one--seemed to break on me.
"I think I see what you are driving at," said I."You mean that the change in the writing must be associated with some new condition affecting the writer, and that that condition existed intermittently ?" Thorndyke nodded approvingly, and I continued: "The only intermittent condition that we know of is the effect of opium.
So that we might consider the clearer signatures to have been made when Jeffrey was in his normal state, and the less distinct ones after a bout of opium-smoking." "That is perfectly sound reasoning," said Thorndyke.

"What further conclusion does it lead to ?" "It suggests that the opium habit had been only recently acquired, since the change was noticed only about the time he went to live at New Inn; and, since the change in the writing is at first intermittent and then continuous, we may infer that the opium-smoking was at first occasional and later became a a confirmed habit." "Quite a reasonable conclusion and very clearly stated," said Thorndyke.
"I don't say that I entirely agree with you, or that you have exhausted the information that these signatures offer.