The pleasant old lady had appeared in the doorway. She curtseyed with a smile to Mr. Holmes, but glanced with some apprehension at the figure upon the sofa.

“It is all right, Martha. He has not been hurt at all.”

“I am glad of that, Mr. Holmes. According to his lights he has been a kind master. He wanted me to go with his wife to Germany yesterday, but that would hardly have suited your plans, would it, sir?”

“No, indeed, Martha. So long as you were here I was easy in my mind. We waited some time for your signal to-night.”

“It was the secretary, sir.”

“I know. His car passed ours.”

“I thought he would never go. I knew that it would not suit your plans, sir, to find him here.”

“No, indeed. Well, it only meant that we waited half an hour or so until I saw your lamp go out and knew that the coast was clear. You can report to me to-morrow in London, Martha, at Claridge’s Hotel.”

“Very good, sir.”

“I suppose you have everything ready to leave.”

“Yes, sir. He posted seven letters to-day. I have the addresses as usual.”

“Very good, Martha. I will look into them to-morrow. Goodnight. These papers,” he continued as the old lady vanished, “are not not of very great importance, for, of course, the information which they represent has been sent off long ago to the German government. These are the originals which could not safely be got out of the country.”

“Then they are of no use.”

“I should not go so far as to say that, Watson. They will at least show our people what is known and what is not. I may say that a good many of these papers have come through me, and I need not add are thoroughly untrustworthy. It would brighten my declining years to see a German cruiser navigating the Solent according to the mine-field plans which I have furnished. But you, Watson” — he stopped his work and took his old friend by the shoulders — “I’ve hardly seen you in the light yet. How have the years used you? You look the same blithe boy as ever. ”

“I feel twenty years younger, Holmes. I have seldom felt so happy as when I got your wire asking me to meet you at Harwich with the car. But you, Holmes — you have changed very little — save for that horrible goatee.”

“These are the sacrifices one makes for one’s country, Watson,” said Holmes, pulling at his little tuft. “To-morrow it will be but a dreadful memory. With my hair cut and a few other superficial changes I shall no doubt reappear at Claridge’s tomorrow as I was before this American stunt — I beg your pardon, Watson, my well of English seems to be permanently defiled — before this American job came my way.”

“But you have retired, Holmes. We heard of you as living the life of a hermit among your bees and your books in a small farm upon the South Downs.”

“Exactly, Watson. Here is the fruit of my leisured ease, the magnum opus of my latter years!” He picked up the volume from the table and read out the whole title, Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, with Some Observations upon the Segregation of the Queen. “Alone I did it. Behold the fruit of pensive nights and laborious days when I watched the little working gangs as once I watched the criminal world of London.”

They passed the narrow track to the hut. Thank heaven it was not wide enough for the chair: hardly wide enough for one person. The chair reached the bottom of the slope, and swerved round, to disappear. And Connie heard a low whistle behind her. She glanced sharply round: the keeper was striding downhill towards her, his dog keeping behind him.

‘Is Sir Clifford going to the cottage?’ he asked, looking into her eyes.

‘No, only to the well.’

‘Ah! Good! Then I can keep out of sight. But I shall see you tonight. I shall wait for you at the park–gate about ten.’

He looked again direct into her eyes.

‘Yes,’ she faltered.

They heard the Papp! Papp! of Clifford’s horn, tooting for Connie. She ‘Coo–eed!’ in reply. The keeper’s face flickered with a little grimace, and with his hand he softly brushed her breast upwards, from underneath. She looked at him, frightened, and started running down the hill, calling Coo–ee! again to Clifford. The man above watched her, then turned, grinning faintly, back into his path.

She found Clifford slowly mounting to the spring, which was halfway up the slope of the dark larch–wood. He was there by the time she caught him up.

‘She did that all right,’ he said, referring to the chair.

Connie looked at the great grey leaves of burdock that grew out ghostly from the edge of the larch–wood. The people call it Robin Hood’s Rhubarb. How silent and gloomy it seemed by the well! Yet the water bubbled so bright, wonderful! And there were bits of eye–bright and strong blue bugle...And there, under the bank, the yellow earth was moving. A mole! It emerged, rowing its pink hands, and waving its blind gimlet of a face, with the tiny pink nose–tip uplifted.

‘It seems to see with the end of its nose,’ said Connie.

‘Better than with its eyes!’ he said. ‘Will you drink?’

‘Will you?’

She took an enamel mug from a twig on a tree, and stooped to fill it for him. He drank in sips. Then she stooped again, and drank a little herself.

‘So icy!’ she said gasping.

‘Good, isn’t it! Did you wish?’

‘Did you?’

‘Yes, I wished. But I won’t tell.’

She was aware of the rapping of a woodpecker, then of the wind, soft and eerie through the larches. She looked up. White clouds were crossing the blue.

‘Clouds!’ she said.

‘White lambs only,’ he replied.

A shadow crossed the little clearing. The mole had swum out on to the soft yellow earth.

‘Unpleasant little beast, we ought to kill him,’ said Clifford.

‘Look! he’s like a parson in a pulpit,’ she said.

She gathered some sprigs of woodruff and brought them to him.

‘New–mown hay!’ he said. ‘Doesn’t it smell like the romantic ladies of the last century, who had their heads screwed on the right way after all!’