“There was something shocking about the man, Mr. Holmes. It wasn’t merely that ghastly face glimmering as white as cheese in the darkness. It was more subtle than that — something slinking, something furtive, something guilty — something very unlike the frank, manly lad that I had known. It left a feeling of horror in my mind.

“But when a man has been soldiering for a year or two with brother Boer as a playmate, he keeps his nerve and acts quickly. Godfrey had hardly vanished before I was at the window. There was an awkward catch, and I was some little time before I could throw it up. Then I nipped through and ran down the garden path in the direction that I thought he might have taken.

“It was a long path and the light was not very good, but it seemed to me something was moving ahead of me. I ran on and called his name, but it was no use. When I got to the end of the path there were several others branching in different directions to various outhouses. I stood hesitating, and as I did so I heard distinctly the sound of a closing door. It was not behind me in the house, but ahead of me, somewhere in the darkness. That was enough, Mr. Holmes, Holmes to assure me that what I had seen was not a vision. Godfrey had run away from me, and he had shut a door behind him. Of that I was certain.

“There was nothing more I could do, and I spent an uneasy night turning the matter over in my mind and trying to find some theory which would cover the facts. Next day I found the colonel rather more conciliatory, and as his wife remarked that there were some places of interest in the neighbourhood, it gave me an opening to ask whether my presence for one more night would incommode them. A somewhat grudging acquiescence from the old man gave me a clear day in which to make my observations. I was already perfectly convinced that Godfrey was in hiding somewhere near, but where and why remained to be solved.

“The house was so large and so rambling that a regiment might be hid away in it and no one the wiser. If the secret lay there it was difficult for me to penetrate it. But the door which I had heard close was certainly not in the house. I must explore the garden and see what I could find. There was no difficulty in the way, for the old people were busy in their own fashion and left me to my own devices.

“There were several small outhouses, but at the end of the garden there was a detached building of some size — large enough for a gardener’s or a gamekeeper‘s residence. Could this be the place whence the sound of that shutting door had come? I approached it in a careless fashion as though I were strolling aimlessly round the grounds. As I did so, a small, brisk, bearded man in a black coat and bowler hat — not at all the gardener type — came out of the door. To my surprise, he locked it after him and put the key in his pocket. Then he looked at me with some surprise on his face.

“ ‘Are you a visitor here?’ he asked.

“I explained that I was and that I was a friend of Godfrey’s.

"Whom did she ask for?"

"M. Michel Beaumont," replied the servant.

"Queer. And why has she called?"

"All she said was that it was about the Enghien business... So I thought that... "

"What! The Enghien business! Then she knows that I am mixed up in that business... She knows that, by applying here... "

"I could not get anything out of her, but I thought, all the same, that I had better let her in."

"Quite right. Where is she?"

"In the drawing-room. I've put on the lights."

Lupin walked briskly across the hall and opened the door of the drawing-room:

"What are you talking about?" he said, to his man. "There's no one here."

"No one here?" said Achille, running up.

And the room, in fact, was empty.

"Well, on my word, this takes the cake!" cried the servant. "It wasn't twenty minutes ago that I came and had a look, to make sure. She was sitting over there. And there's nothing wrong with my eyesight, you know."

"Look here, look here," said Lupin, irritably. "Where were you while the woman was waiting?"

"In the hail, governor! I never left the hail for a second! I should have seen her go out, blow it!"

"Still, she's not here now... "

"So I see," moaned the man, quite flabbergasted.

"She must have got tired of waiting and gone away. But, dash it all, I should like to know how she got out!"

"How she got out?" said Lupin. "It doesn't take a wizard to tell that."

"What do you mean?"

"She got out through the window. Look, it's still ajar We are on the ground-floor... The street is almost always deserted, in the evenings. There's no doubt about it."

He had looked around him and satisfied himself that nothing had been taken away or moved. The room, for that matter, contained no knicknack of any value, no important paper that might have explained the woman's visit, followed by her sudden disappearance. And yet why that inexplicable flight?

"Has any one telephoned?" he asked.

"No."

"Any letters?"

"Yes, one letter by the last post."

"Where is it?"

"I put it on your mantel-piece, governor, as usual."

Lupin's bedroom was next to the drawing-room, but Lupin had permanently bolted the door between the two. He, therefore, had to go through the hall again.

Lupin switched on the electric light and, the next moment, said:

"I don't see it... "

"Yes... I put it next to the flower-bowl."

"There's nothing here at all."

"You must be looking in the wrong place, governor."

But Achille moved the bowl, lifted the clock, bent down to the grate, in vain: the letter was not there.

"Oh blast it, blast it!" he muttered. "She's done it... she's taken it... And then, when she had the letter, she cleared out... Oh, the slut!... "

Lupin said:

"You're mad! There's no way through between the two rooms."

"Then who did take it, governor?"

They were both of them silent. Lupin strove to control his anger and collect his ideas. He asked:

"Did you look at the envelope?"

"Yes."

"Anything particular about it?"

""Yes, it looked as if it had been written in a hurry, or scribbled, rather."