genuinely relieved.

"You doubtless have good reasons," he said.

"Merely that I wish to obtain my impressions uncoloured. This delicate
clue I am working on might be so easily blurred by the thought-currents
of another mind with strongly preconceived ideas."

"Perfectly. I understand," rejoined the soldier, though with an
expression of countenance that plainly contradicted his words. "Then I
will wait here with the dogs; and we'll have a look at the laundry on
our way home."

I turned once to look back as we clambered over the low stone wall built
by the late owner, and saw his straight, soldierly figure standing in
the sunlit field watching us with a curiously intent look on his face.
There was something to me incongruous, yet distinctly pathetic, in the
man's efforts to meet all far-fetched explanations of the mystery with
contempt, and at the same time in his stolid, unswerving investigation
of it all. He nodded at me and made a gesture of farewell with his hand.
That picture of him, standing in the sunshine with his big dogs,
steadily watching us, remains with me to this day.

Dr. Silence led the way in among the twisted trunks, planted closely
together in serried ranks, and I followed sharp at his heels. The moment
we were out of sight he turned and put down his gun against the roots of
a big tree, and I did likewise.

"We shall hardly want these cumbersome weapons of murder," he observed,
with a passing smile.

"You are sure of your clue, then?" I asked at once, bursting with
curiosity, yet fearing to betray it lest he should think me unworthy.
His own methods were so absolutely simple and untheatrical.

"I am sure of my clue," he answered gravely. "And I think we have come
just in time. You shall know in due course. For the present--be content
to follow and observe. And think, steadily. The support of your mind
will help me."

His voice had that quiet mastery in it which leads men to face death
with a sort of happiness and pride. I would have followed him anywhere
at that moment. At the same time his words conveyed a sense of dread
seriousness. I caught the thrill of his confidence; but also, in this
broad light of day, I felt the measure of alarm that lay behind.

"You still have no strong impressions?" he asked. "Nothing happened in
the night, for instance? No vivid dreamings?"

He looked closely for my answer, I was aware.

"I slept almost an unbroken sleep. I was tremendously tired, you know,