the boy. It contained
a loaf of bread, a tinned tongue, and two tins of preserved
peaches. As I set it down again, after having examined it, my
heart leaped to see that beneath it there lay a sheet of paper
with writing upon it. I raised it, and this was what I read,
roughly scrawled in pencil:--

Dr. Watson has gone to Coombe Tracey.

For a minute I stood there with the paper in my hands thinking
out the meaning of this curt message. It was I, then, and not Sir
Henry, who was being dogged by this secret man. He had not
followed me himself, but he had set an agent--the boy,
perhaps--upon my track, and this was his report. Possibly I had
taken no step since I had been upon the moor which had not been
observed and reported. Always there was this feeling of an unseen
force, a fine net drawn round us with infinite skill and
delicacy, holding us so lightly that it was only at some supreme
moment that one realized that one was indeed entangled in its
meshes.

If there was one report there might be others, so I looked round
the hut in search of them. There was no trace, however, of
anything of the kind, nor could I discover any sign which might
indicate the character or intentions of the man who lived in this
singular place, save that he must be of Spartan habits and cared
little for the comforts of life. When I thought of the heavy
rains and looked at the gaping roof I understood how strong and
immutable must be the purpose which had kept him in that
inhospitable abode. Was he our malignant enemy, or was he by
chance our guardian angel? I swore that I would not leave the hut
until I knew.

Outside the sun was sinking low and the west was blazing with
scarlet and gold. Its reflection was shot back in ruddy patches
by the distant pools which lay amid the great Grimpen Mire. There
were the two towers of Baskerville Hall, and there a distant blur
of smoke which marked the village of Grimpen. Between the two,
behind the hill, was the house of the Stapletons. All was sweet
and mellow and peaceful in the golden evening light, and yet as I
looked at them my soul shared none of the peace of nature but
quivered at the vagueness and the terror of that interview which
every instant was bringing nearer. With tingling nerves, but a
fixed purpose, I sat in the dark recess of the hut and waited
with sombre patience for the coming of its tenant.

And then at last I heard him. Far away came the sharp clink of a
boot striking upon a s