ook her hands out of
the water and was drying them absentminded like on the roller towel,
when she found that she was drying someone else's hand as well, only
colder than hers."

"What nonsense!" exclaimed Saunders.

"Exactly, sir; that's what I told her; but we couldn't get her to stop."

"You don't believe all this?" said Eustace, turning suddenly towards the
butler.

"Me, sir? Oh, no, sir! I've not seen anything."

"Nor heard anything?"

"Well, sir, if you must know, the bells do ring at odd times, and
there's nobody there when we go; and when we go round to draw the blinds
of a night, as often as not somebody's been there before us. But as I
says to Mrs. Merrit, a young monkey might do wonderful things, and we
all know that Mr. Borlsover has had some strange animals about the
place."

"Very well, Morton, that will do."

"What do you make of it?" asked Saunders when they were alone. "I mean
of the letter he said you wrote."

"Oh, that's simple enough," said Eustace. "See the paper it's written
on? I stopped using that years ago, but there were a few odd sheets and
envelopes left in the old desk. We never fastened up the lid of the box
before locking it in. The hand got out, found a pencil, wrote this note,
and shoved it through the crack on to the floor where Morton found it.
That's plain as daylight."

"But the hand couldn't write?"

"Couldn't it? You've not seen it do the things I've seen," and he told
Saunders more of what had happened at Eastbourne.

"Well," said Saunders, "in that case we have at least an explanation of
the legacy. It was the hand which wrote unknown to your uncle that
letter to your solicitor, bequeathing itself to you. Your uncle had no
more to do with that request than I. In fact, it would seem that he had
some idea of this automatic writing, and feared it."

"Then if it's not my uncle, what is it?"

"I suppose some people might say that a disembodied spirit had got your
uncle to educate and prepare a little body for it. Now it's got into
that little body and is off on its own."

"Well, what are we to do?"

"We'll keep our eyes open," said Saunders, "and try to catch it. If we
can't do that, we shall have to wait till the bally clockwork runs down.
After all, if it's flesh and blood, it can't live forever."

For two days nothing happened. Then Saunders saw it sliding down the
banister in the hall. He was taken unawares, and lost a full second
before he started in pursui