ith the lighted-up
road outside, and as he groped forward, closely followed by the
lodger, there came over Bunting a sudden, reeling sensation of
mortal terror, an instinctive, assailing knowledge of frightful
immediate danger.

A stuffless voice--the voice of his first wife, the long-dead
girl to whom his mind so seldom reverted nowadays--uttered into
his ear the words, "Take care!"

And then the lodger spoke. His voice was harsh and grating,
though not loud.

"I'm afraid, Mr. Bunting, that you must have felt something dirty,
foul, on my coat? It's too long a story to tell you now, but I
brushed up against a dead animal, a creature to whose misery some
thoughtful soul had put an end, lying across a bench on Primrose
Hill."

"No, sir, no. I didn't notice nothing. I scarcely touched you,
sir."

It seemed as if a power outside himself compelled Bunting to utter
these lying words. "And now, sir, I'll be saying good-night to you,"
he said.

Stepping back he pressed with all the strength that was in him
against the wall, and let the other pass him. There was a pause,
and then--"Good-night," returned Mr. Sleuth, in a hollow voice.
Bunting waited until the lodger had gone upstairs, and then,
lighting the gas, he sat down there, in the hall. Mr. Sleuth's
landlord felt very queer--queer and sick.

He did not draw his left hand out of his pocket till he heard Mr.
Sleuth shut the bedroom door upstairs. Then he held up his left
hand and looked at it curiously; it was flecked, streaked with
pale reddish blood.

Taking off his boots, he crept into the room where his wife lay
asleep. Stealthily he walked across to the wash-hand-stand, and
dipped a hand into the water-jug.

"Whatever are you doing? What on earth are you doing?" came a
voice from the bed, and Bunting started guiltily.

"I'm just washing my hands."

"Indeed, you're doing nothing of the sort! I never heard of such
a thing--putting your hand into the water in which I was going to
wash my face to-morrow morning!"

"I'm very sorry, Ellen," he said meekly; "I meant to throw it away.
You don't suppose I would have let you wash in dirty water, do you?"

She said no more, but, as he began undressing himself, Mrs. Bunting
lay staring at him in a way that made her husband feel even more
uncomfortable than he was already.

At last he got into bed. He wanted to break the oppressive silence
by telling Ellen about the sovereign the young lady had given him,
but