ugly and almost grotesque scene that
had broken up the group in the garden.

"It was a monkey-trick of mine," observed Fisher, gloomily, "putting
phosphorus on the target; but the only chance to make him jump was
to give him the horrors suddenly. And when he saw the face he'd shot
at shining on the target he practiced on, all lit up with an
infernal light, he did jump. Quite enough for my own intellectual
satisfaction."

"I'm afraid I don't quite understand even now," said March, "exactly
what he did or why he did it."

"You ought to," replied Fisher, with his rather dreary smile, "for
you gave me the first suggestion yourself. Oh yes, you did; and it
was a very shrewd one. You said a man wouldn't take sandwiches with
him to dine at a great house. It was quite true; and the inference
was that, though he was going there, he didn't mean to dine there.
Or, at any rate, that he might not be dining there. It occurred to
me at once that he probably expected the visit to be unpleasant, or
the reception doubtful, or something that would prevent his
accepting hospitality. Then it struck me that Turnbull was a terror
to certain shady characters in the past, and that he had come down
to identify and denounce one of them. The chances at the start
pointed to the host--that is, Jenkins. I'm morally certain now that
Jenkins was the undesirable alien Turnbull wanted to convict in
another shooting-affair, but you see the shooting gentleman had
another shot in his locker."

"But you said he would have to be a very good shot," protested
March.

"Jenkins is a very good shot," said Fisher. "A very good shot who
can pretend to be a very bad shot. Shall I tell you the second hint
I hit on, after yours, to make me think it was Jenkins? It was my
cousin's account of his bad shooting. He'd shot a cockade off a hat
and a weathercock off a building. Now, in fact, a man must shoot
very well indeed to shoot so badly as that. He must shoot very
neatly to hit the cockade and not the head, or even the hat. If the
shots had really gone at random, the chances are a thousand to one
that they would not have hit such prominent and picturesque objects.
They were chosen because they were prominent and picturesque
objects. They make a story to go the round of society. He keeps the
crooked weathercock in the summerhouse to perpetuate the story of a
legend. And then he lay in wait with his evil eye and wicked gun,
safely ambushed behind the legend of h