ead his
friend's thought and hastened to contradict it. Then he went on:

"I entered the hall, or passage, rather."

He paused again. His uneasiness was becoming very apparent.

"And you did catch somebody?" said the Father.

Guildea cleared his throat.

"That's just it," he said, "now we come to it. I'm not imaginative, as
you know."

"You certainly are not."

"No, but hardly had I stepped into the passage before I felt certain
that somebody had got into the house during my absence. I felt convinced
of it, and not only that, I also felt convinced that the intruder was
the very person I had dimly seen sitting upon the seat in the Park. What
d'you say to that?"

"I begin to think you are imaginative."

"H'm! It seemed to me that the person--the occupant of the seat--and I,
had simultaneously formed the project of interviewing each other, had
simultaneously set out to put that project into execution. I became so
certain of this that I walked hastily upstairs into this room, expecting
to find the visitor awaiting me. But there was no one. I then came down
again and went into the dining-room. No one. I was actually astonished.
Isn't that odd?"

"Very," said the Father, quite gravely.

The Professor's chill and gloomy manner, and uncomfortable, constrained
appearance kept away the humour that might well have lurked round the
steps of such a discourse.

"I went upstairs again," he continued, "sat down and thought the matter
over. I resolved to forget it, and took up a book. I might perhaps have
been able to read, but suddenly I thought I noticed----"

He stopped abruptly. Father Murchison observed that he was staring
towards the green baize that covered the parrot's cage.

"But that's nothing," he said. "Enough that I couldn't read. I resolved
to explore the house. You know how small it is, how easily one can go
all over it. I went all over it. I went into every room without
exception. To the servants, who were having supper, I made some excuse.
They were surprised at my advent, no doubt."

"And Pitting?"

"Oh, he got up politely when I came in, stood while I was there, but
never said a word. I muttered 'don't disturb yourselves,' or something
of the sort, and came out. Murchison, I found nobody new in the
house--yet I returned to this room entirely convinced that somebody had
entered while I was in the Park."

"And gone out again before you came back?"

"No, had stayed, and was still in the house."