to know regarding the mystery of Rantremly Castle.'

Sophia Brooks accepted the money without demur, and thanked me. I
could see that her thin hands were trembling with excitement as she
put the crackling banknote into her purse.

* * * * *

Darkness was coming on next evening before we were installed in the
grim building, which at first sight seemed more like a fortress than a
residence. I had telegraphed from London to order a wagonette for us,
and in this vehicle we drove to the police station, where I presented
the written order from Lord Rantremly for the keys of the castle. The
chief constable himself, a stolid, taciturn person, exhibited,
nevertheless, some interest in my mission, and he was good enough to
take the fourth seat in the wagonette, and accompany us through the
park to the castle, returning in that conveyance to the village as
nightfall approached, and I could not but notice that this grave
official betrayed some uneasiness to get off before dusk had
completely set in. Silent as he was, I soon learned that he entirely
disbelieved Lord Rantremly's theory that the castle harboured
dangerous characters, yet so great was his inherent respect for the
nobility that I could not induce him to dispute with any decisiveness
his lordship's conjecture. It was plain to be seen, however, that the
chief constable believed implicitly in the club-footed ghost. I asked
him to return the next morning, as I should spend the night in
investigation, and might possibly have some questions to ask him,
questions which none but the chief constable could answer. The good
man promised, and left us rather hurriedly, the driver of the
wagonette galloping his horse down the long, sombre avenue towards the
village outside the gates.

I found Sophia Brooks but a doleful companion, and of very little
assistance that evening. She seemed overcome by her remembrances. She
had visited the library where her former work was done, doubtless the
scene of her brief love episode, and she returned with red eyes and
trembling chin, telling me haltingly that the great tome from which
she was working ten years ago, and which had been left open on the
solid library table, was still there exactly as she had placed it
before being forced to abandon her work. For a decade apparently no
one had entered that library. I could not but sympathise with the poor
lady, thus revisiting, almost herself like a ghost, the haunted