lways respectfully referred to as
Mr. Prior, and that it was in the domestic life of the dead farmer
that he had been bidden to seek the seed of these dreadful things.
As a matter of fact, he had found that no local inquiries had
revealed anything at all about the Prior family.

The moonlight had broadened and brightened, the wind had driven off
the clouds and itself died fitfully away, when he came round again
to the artificial lake in front of the house. For some reason it
looked a very artificial lake; indeed, the whole scene was like a
classical landscape with a touch of Watteau; the Palladian facade of
the house pale in the moon, and the same silver touching the very
pagan and naked marble nymph in the middle of the pond. Rather to
his surprise, he found another figure there beside the statue,
sitting almost equally motionless; and the same silver pencil traced
the wrinkled brow and patient face of Horne Fisher, still dressed as
a hermit and apparently practicing something of the solitude of a
hermit. Nevertheless, he looked up at Leonard Crane and smiled,
almost as if he had expected him.

"Look here," said Crane, planting himself in front of him, "can you
tell me anything about this business?"

"I shall soon have to tell everybody everything about it," replied
Fisher, "but I've no objection to telling you something first. But,
to begin with, will you tell me something? What really happened when
you met Bulmer this morning? You did throw away your sword, but you
didn't kill him."

"I didn't kill him because I threw away my sword," said the other.
"I did it on purpose--or I'm not sure what might have happened."

After a pause he went on, quietly: "The late Lord Bulmer was a very
breezy gentleman, extremely breezy. He was very genial with his
inferiors, and would have his lawyer and his architect staying in
his house for all sorts of holidays and amusements. But there was
another side to him, which they found out when they tried to be his
equals. When I told him that his sister and I were engaged,
something happened which I simply can't and won't describe. It
seemed to me like some monstrous upheaval of madness. But I suppose
the truth is painfully simple. There is such a thing as the
coarseness of a gentleman. And it is the most horrible thing in
humanity."

"I know," said Fisher. "The Renaissance nobles of the Tudor time
were like that."

"It is odd that you should say that," Crane went on. "For while