mes will follow it. I affirm nothing, but I
conceive the agency responsible for these murders to
be still active, since the police have been so completely
foiled. At Chadlands there may still remain an unsleeping
danger to those who follow you--a danger, indeed, to all
human life, so long as it is permitted to persist. I write,
of course, assuming you to be desirous of clearing this
abominable mystery, both for your own satisfaction and the
credit of your house. "There is but little to hope from me,
and I would beg you not to feel sanguine in any way. Yet
this I do believe: that if there is one man in the world
to-day who holds the key of your tribulation, I am that man.
One lives in hope that one may empty the world of so great a
horror; and to do so would give one the most active
satisfaction. But I promise nothing.

"If I should be on the right track, however, let me explain
the direction in which my mind is moving. Human knowledge
may not be equal to any solution, and I may fail accordingly.
It may even be possible that the Rev. Septimus May did not
err, and that at the cost of his life he exorcised some
spirit whose operations were permitted for reasons hid in
the mind of its Creator; but, so far as I am concerned, I
believe otherwise. And if I should prove correct, it will
be possible to show that all has fallen out in a manner
consonant with human reason and explicable by human
understanding. I therefore came to England, glad of the
excuse to do so, and waited upon you at your manor, only to
hear, much to my chagrin, that you were not in residence,
but had gone to Florence, a bird's journey from my own home!

"Now I write to the post-office at Milan, where your servant
directed me that letters should for the moment be sent. If
you are returning soon, I wait for you. If not, it may be
possible to meet in Italy. But I should prefer to think
you return ere long, for I cannot be of practical service
until I have myself, with your permission, visited your
house and seen the Grey Room with my own eyes.

"I beg you will accept my assurances of kindly regard and
sympathy in the great sufferings you and Madame May have
been called upon to endure.

"Until I hear from you, I remain at Claridge's Hotel in
London.

"I have the hono