of
its sagged parchment, and dust upon the drumsticks thrust within its
frayed strapping; in the corner opposite an old military chest which
held the bunting for the flagstaff--a Union flag, a couple of
ensigns, and half a dozen odd square-signals and pennants. I stooped
over this, and as I did so I observed that there were finger-marks on
the dust at the edge of the lid; but, lifting it, found the flags
inside neatly rolled and stowed in order. On the table lay my
father's Bible and his pocket Virgil, the latter open and laid face
downwards. I picked it up, and the next moment came near to dropping
it again with a shiver, for a dry smear of blood crossed the two
pages.

Here, not to complicate mysteries, let me tell at once what Ann told
me later--that she had found the book lying in the blood-dabbled
grass before the step, when it must have fallen from my father's
hand, and had replaced it upon the table. But for the moment,
surmising another clue, I stared at the page--a page of the seventh
"Aeneid"--and at the stain which, as if to underline them, started
beneath the words--

"Hic domus, haec patria est. Genitor mihi talia namque
(Nunc repeto) Anchises fatorum arcana reliquit."

I set down the book as I had found it, stepped forth again into the
sunshine. The scouring of the step had left a moist puddle below it,
where the ground, no doubt, had been dry and hard on the evening of
the murder. At the edge of this puddle the turf twinkled with clean
dew--close, well-trimmed turf sloping gently to the stream which
formed the real boundary of the garden; but Miss Belcher, the
neighbouring land-owner, a person of great wealth and the most
eccentric good-nature, had allowed my father to build a wall on the
far side, for privacy, and had granted him an entrance through it to
her park--a narrow wooden door to which a miniature bridge gave
access across the stream.

There were thus three ways of approaching the summer-house; (1) by
the path which wound through the garden from the house, (2) across
the turf from the side-gate, which opened out of a lane, or
woodcutters' road, running at right angles from the turnpike and
alongside the garden fence towards the park; and (3) from the park
itself, across the little bridge. From the bridge a straight line to
the summer-house would lie behind the angle of sight of any one
seated within; so that a visitor, stepping with caution, might
present himself at the