oo far away to intercept her, or reach her if she slipped. He
stopped and watched her climb to the top of the wall, and stand there,
like a creature of the sea, with the spray leaping hungrily at her
slight figure. He saw her take something from the bosom of her dress and
cast it into the wild waste of seething waters in front of her. Having
done this she turned to descend the breakwater. Colwyn had barely time
to leave the path, and take refuge in the shadow of the wall, before she
reached the path again and set out to retrace her steps across the
lonely marshes.

CHAPTER XI

Colwyn waited on the marshes until the coming of the dawn revealed the
breakwater and the sea crashing against it. A brief scrutiny of the
white waste of waters, raging endlessly against the barrier, convinced
him of the futility of attempting to discover what the innkeeper's
daughter had thrown from the breakwater wall an hour before. The sea
would retain her secret.

The sea mist hung heavily over the marshes as Colwyn cautiously picked
his way back along the slippery canal path. Sooner than he expected, the
inn appeared from the grey mist like a sheeted ghost. Colwyn stood for a
few moments regarding the place attentively. There was something weird
and sinister about this lonely inn on the edge of the marshes. Strange
things must have happened there in the past, but the lawless secrets of
a bygone generation of smugglers had been safely kept by the old inn.
The cold morning light imparted the semblance of a leer to the circular
windows high up in the white wall, as though they defied the world to
discover the secret of the death of Roger Glenthorpe.

There was no sign of life about the inn as Colwyn approached it. The
back door yielded to his pull on the latch, and he gained his room
unobserved; apparently all the inmates were still wrapped in slumber.
Colwyn spent half an hour or so in making some sort of a toilet. He had
brought a suit-case with him in the car, so he changed his wet clothes,
shaved himself in cold water, washed, and brushed his hair. He looked
at his watch, and found that it was after six o'clock. He wondered if
the girl Peggy was sleeping after her night's adventure.

A swishing noise, somewhere in the lower regions, broke the profound
stillness of the house. Somebody was washing the floor, somewhere.
Colwyn opened his door and went downstairs. Ann, the stout servant, was
washing the passage. She was on her hands