Punch, evidently exhausted, staggered in from the left and
threw himself down among the trees. His pursuer was not long after
him, and came looking uncertainly from side to side. Then, catching
sight of the figure on the ground, he too threw himself down--his back
was turned to the audience--with a swift motion twitched the covering
from his head, and thrust his face into that of Punch. Everything on
the instant grew dark.

There was one long, loud, shuddering scream, and I awoke to find
myself looking straight into the face of--what in all the world do you
think?--but a large owl, which was seated on my window-sill
immediately opposite my bed-foot, holding up its wings like two
shrouded arms. I caught the fierce glance of its yellow eyes, and then
it was gone. I heard the single enormous bell again--very likely, as
you are saying to yourself, the church clock; but I do not think
so--and then I was broad awake.

All this, I may say, happened within the last half-hour. There was no
probability of my getting to sleep again, so I got up, put on clothes
enough to keep me warm, and am writing this rigmarole in the first
hours of Christmas Day. Have I left out anything? Yes, there was no
Toby dog, and the names over the front of the Punch and Judy booth
were Kidman and Gallop, which were certainly not what the bagman told
me to look out for.

By this time, I feel a little more as if I could sleep, so this shall
be sealed and wafered.

LETTER IV

_Dec. 26, '37._

MY DEAR ROBERT,--All is over. The body has been found. I do not make
excuses for not having sent off my news by last night's mail, for the
simple reason that I was incapable of putting pen to paper. The events
that attended the discovery bewildered me so completely that I needed
what I could get of a night's rest to enable me to face the situation
at all. Now I can give you my journal of the day, certainly the
strangest Christmas Day that ever I spent or am likely to spend.

The first incident was not very serious. Mr. Bowman had, I think, been
keeping Christmas Eve, and was a little inclined to be captious: at
least, he was not on foot very early, and to judge from what I could
hear, neither men or maids could do anything to please him. The latter
were certainly reduced to tears; nor am I sure that Mr. Bowman
succeeded in preserving a manly composure. At any rate, when I came
downstairs, it was in a broken voice that he wished me the complimen