for delicate and important matters,
such as lending a duke a thousand pounds or declining to lend him
sixpence. It is a mark of the magnificent tolerance of Mr. Lever that
he permitted this holy place to be for about half an hour profaned by a
mere priest, scribbling away on a piece of paper. The story which Father
Brown was writing down was very likely a much better story than this
one, only it will never be known. I can merely state that it was very
nearly as long, and that the last two or three paragraphs of it were the
least exciting and absorbing.

For it was by the time that he had reached these that the priest began a
little to allow his thoughts to wander and his animal senses, which were
commonly keen, to awaken. The time of darkness and dinner was drawing
on; his own forgotten little room was without a light, and perhaps the
gathering gloom, as occasionally happens, sharpened the sense of sound.
As Father Brown wrote the last and least essential part of his document,
he caught himself writing to the rhythm of a recurrent noise outside,
just as one sometimes thinks to the tune of a railway train. When he
became conscious of the thing he found what it was: only the ordinary
patter of feet passing the door, which in an hotel was no very unlikely
matter. Nevertheless, he stared at the darkened ceiling, and listened to
the sound. After he had listened for a few seconds dreamily, he got to
his feet and listened intently, with his head a little on one side.
Then he sat down again and buried his brow in his hands, now not merely
listening, but listening and thinking also.

The footsteps outside at any given moment were such as one might hear in
any hotel; and yet, taken as a whole, there was something very strange
about them. There were no other footsteps. It was always a very silent
house, for the few familiar guests went at once to their own apartments,
and the well-trained waiters were told to be almost invisible until
they were wanted. One could not conceive any place where there was less
reason to apprehend anything irregular. But these footsteps were so
odd that one could not decide to call them regular or irregular. Father
Brown followed them with his finger on the edge of the table, like a man
trying to learn a tune on the piano.

First, there came a long rush of rapid little steps, such as a light man
might make in winning a walking race. At a certain point they stopped
and changed to a sort of slow, swing