and it was extremely unsatisfactory. The judge must
have imposed himself on Miss King, and induced her to receive him by
means of threats. Such things have, no doubt, been done occasionally;
though rarely by judges. People, especially women with doubtful pasts,
are always open to threats of exposure, and may be induced to submit to
blackmail. Sir Gilbert Hawkesby was evidently--Meldon had ample
evidence of this--determined to fish. He was, according to Doyle and
Sabina Gallagher, in a bad temper, and therefore, for the time,
unscrupulous. He had spent a most uncomfortable night. He was also
extremely hungry. It was just possible that he had forced himself upon
Miss King. Meldon sighed. This adjustment of the facts was not
satisfactory, but there was no other. He knocked the ashes out of his
pipe and stood up. Then he became aware that Callaghan was watching
him from the far end of the lawn. Meldon walked over to him.

"If it's news about Mr. Simpkins you want," said Callaghan, "there's
none, for he hasn't been near the place since the last day I was
talking to you."

"For the immediate present," said Meldon, "I'm not so much interested
in Mr. Simpkins as in another gentleman that came here to-day."

"Is it him they call Sir Gilbert Hawkesby?"

"It is," said Meldon, "that very man. Did you see him?"

"I did. It was half past ten o'clock, or maybe a little later, and the
young lady was just after coming out with a terrible big lot of papers
along with her. She sat herself down there in the little bed where you
were lying this minute, and 'Good morning to you, Callaghan,' she says
when she saw me."

"What were you doing there?" said Meldon.

"I was looking at her. Wasn't that what you told me to do? I was
watching out the same as I've been doing this last week, the way
Simpkins wouldn't come on her unawares, and me maybe somewhere else and
not seeing him."

"All right," said Meldon. "I haven't the least doubt that's exactly
what you were doing. I put the wrong question to you. What I ought to
have asked you was this: What did Miss King think you were doing? What
were you pretending to do?"

"I was making as if I was scuffling the walk with a hoe, and the Lord
knows it wants scuffling, for the way the weeds grow on it is what
you'd hardly believe."

"Well, and after she said good morning to you what happened?"

"There wasn't anything happened then," said Callaghan, "unless it would
be so