ch despised the weakness of mere verbal emphasis.

"Lose no time. Spare no money," said Phil rapidly. His words and
utterance contrasted forcibly with the stillness and composure of the
man he was addressing. "Think what it means! Let me know everything that
happens. Send me telegrams. Follow this thing out night and day. I
depend on you--"

"Phil, Phil!" remonstrated Miss Heredith. "Mr. Colwyn has already
promised to do all he can. You must be patient."

"Patience! My God, don't talk to me of patience," retorted her nephew
fiercely. "I shall have no patience nor peace till this thing is
settled."

Miss Heredith looked at him sadly. His breach of good manners in
uttering an oath in her presence hurt her worse than a blow, but her
heart sickened with the realization that it was but another
manifestation of the complete change in him which had been brought about
by his wife's murder. Colwyn brought the scene to a close.

"Of course I shall communicate with you," he said to Phil, as he took
his departure. Phil accompanied him to his car, and stood under the
portico watching him as he drove away. Colwyn glanced back as he crossed
the moat-house bridge. The young man was still standing in the open
doorway, looking after him. The next moment the bend of the carriage way
hid him from view.

Colwyn encountered Tufnell at the next bend of the drive, waiting for
him on the path under the trees which bordered the edge. The detective
pulled up his car and stepped out.

"It was just off here, sir, that I thought I saw the figure that night,"
said the butler.

He plunged into a leafy avenue which led off the path at right angles,
and followed it into the wood until he reached the mossy trunk of a
great oak, which flung a gnarled arm horizontally across the narrow walk
as though barring further intrusion into its domain. Tufnell stopped,
and turned to the detective.

"It seemed to me as though a man was crouching just about here, sir," he
said in a whisper, as if he feared that the intruder might still be
hiding there and overhear his words.

Colwyn carefully examined the spot. The moss and grass where he stood
grew fresh underfoot, with no marks to suggest that they had been
trodden on recently. But close by, behind the horizontal branch of the
great oak, was a tangled patch of undergrowth and brambles, broken and
pressed down in places, as though it had been entered by a human being.
As Colwyn was looking at this place,