divorce all forgotten--and the abominable Roger cut finally out of her
life!--

The figure disappeared; he heard the closing of the window, which was
soon dark. Then he crept down to the farm wall, and round the corner of
it to that outer cart-shed, where he had bound up his bleeding hand on
the night when Halsey--silly ass!--had seen the ghost. He did not dare to
smoke lest spark or smell might betray him. Sitting on a heap of sacks in
a sheltered corner, his hands hanging over his knees, he spent some long
time brooding and pondering--conscious all the while of the hidden and
silent life of the house and farm at his back. By now he fancied he
understood the evening ways of the place. The two girls went up to bed
first, about nine; the two ladies, about an hour later; and the farm
bailiff as a rule did not sleep on the premises, though there was a bed
in the loft over the stable which could be used on occasion. That window,
too, through which he had watched the pair of lovers, when the Yankee
discovered him--that also seemed to fit into a scheme.

Yes!--the Yankee had discovered him. His start, his sudden movement as
though to make a rush at the window, had shown it. Meanwhile Delane
had not waited for developments. Quick as thought he had made for one of
those sunken climbing lanes in which the chalk downs of the district
abound, a lane which lay to the south of the farm, while the green
terraced path connected with the ghost-story lay to the north of it. No
doubt there had been a hue and cry, a search of the farm and its
immediate neighbourhood. But the night was dark and the woods wide. Once
in their shelter, he had laughed at pursuit. What had the Yankee said to
Rachel? And since he had stopped her in the lane, what had Rachel been
saying to the Yankee? Had she yet explained that the face he had seen at
the window--supposing always that he had told her what he had seen--and
why shouldn't he?--was not the face of a casual tramp or lunatic, but the
face of a discarded husband, to whom all the various hauntings and
apparitions at the farm had been really due?

That was the question--the all-important question. Clearly some
one--Ellesborough probably--had given a warning to the police. On what
theory?--ghost?--tramp?--or husband?

Or had Rachel just held her tongue, and had the Yankee been led to
believe that the husband--for Rachel must have owned up about the husband
though she did call herself Miss Henderson!--