he wife of the game-keeper.

She had oily black hair and a very lowering and unpleasant cast of
countenance; whilst the large earrings which she wore added to her
gipsy appearance. An argument of some kind was in progress between the
two, for ever and anon the woman would raise her eyes from her task
and dart venomous glances at the man, who knelt upon the floor packing
the big box. Fragments of the conversation reached me through the
partly open window, and although it was difficult to follow I gathered
that the woman was reproaching her husband with some alleged
indiscretion which had necessitated the departure for which they were
preparing. Hawkins retorted with a savage energy which displayed the
darker side of the man's character and the one which I had suspected
to lie beneath his rather sinister merriment.

Having satisfied myself that the pair were deeply occupied with their
personal affairs, I crept out upon the drive and began to approach the
house. I had formed a rough idea of the distance at which it lay from
the road and this was proved to have been about correct. The drive
swung round in a wide semi-circle and presently, majestic in the
moonlight, with some of its mediaeval charm restored by the magic of
night, I saw Friar's Park before me.

It was a low, rambling building, bespeaking the monastery in some of
its severe outlines and showing a succession of cloisteresque arches
on the left, terminated by a chapel beyond which rose the ancient
tower visible from the inn-window--a wonderful example of Saxon
architecture, and closely resembling that at Earl's Barton. There was
no light in any of the windows, and indeed as I peered more closely
across the wide space intervening between the end of the drive and the
main entrance of the house, it seemed to me that the place was more of
a ruin than a habitable establishment.

Unaware of what eyes might be watching me from any one of the numerous
windows, I stepped into the shrubbery beneath the trees bordering the
drive, and set out to make a detour of the house without, if possible,
revealing my presence to any one who might be watching from within.

In the prosecution of this plan, I met with not a little difficulty;
several times, in fact, I had to show myself in the moonlight upon the
edge of the unkempt lawns, but by this device and that, I finally
achieved my purpose and returned to the spot from whence I had set
out, without having attracted any visibl