But why had she come to visit me at the Abbey Inn and what had she gained by this interview?  Perhaps—­I reflected, as I plodded along the deserted country road—­she had been interrupted on that occasion by the inopportune appearance of Dr. Damar Greefe.  Again, why had he appeared there at that moment if not because he had suspected her presence at the Inn; and what was the relationship existing between these two singular people?

That the strange story related to me by the idiotic Edward Hines simply resolved itself into an idle adventure on the part of the mysterious woman, which she had been forced to terminate (somewhat ferociously, I admit) by the uncouth ardor of this rustic swain I seemed to perceive.  But unless her visit to the Abbey Inn portended that she had selected me as Mr. Edward Hines’ successor, I failed to fit it into the scheme.

I began to long for the presence of Inspector Gatton, for the assistance of his trained mind in plumbing these depths which defied my single efforts.  Who this woman could be I failed to imagine; and assuming that she had been concerned in the death of the late baronet, in what way she stood to profit by it was utterly beyond my comprehension, as was the position of Dr. Damar Greefe in the matter.

On I walked and on, unconsciously increasing my pace as is my way when I am lost in abstraction; and, perhaps stimulated to greater mental clarity by the exercise, some of my doubts were dispersed and I became convinced at last that the shadowy figure which had dogged my footsteps on the night of the crime—­the owner of those blazing eyes which had watched me from my garden—­the woman who had stolen the amulet from my writing-table, and the woman who had mutilated Edward Hines, were one and the same as my visitor at the Abbey Inn—­and the unseen speaker who had conversed beneath my window on the night of my arrival at Upper Crossleys!

Here then was a definite chain linking the Red House with Friar’s Park, or at least with its vicinity, and now so clearly did my ideas fit themselves each into its correct place, that I determined upon the identity of that other speaker who had stood in the shadows opposite the Inn when I had awakened in the night.  Mentally I recaptured the high, rather coarse tones of his voice, and remembering how, touched by the spell which had seemed to lie upon the whole country-side, I had thought of him as Asmodeus, the master of the witches’ revels, I determined that my judgment had been not inexact.  For now I identified the speaker as Dr. Damar Greefe!

So far my meditations had proceeded and I suppose I was about half-way on my journey towards the Abbey Inn, when all at once I became aware again of that uncomfortable feeling of surveillance.  As on that night when returning from the Red House to my cottage I had experienced a conviction that I was followed, so now a like conviction impressed itself upon my mind.  But whereas on the former occasion I had been less fearful than curious, now I was aware of a positive dread of this follower whose presence I had detected, by what sense I know not, and of a certainty of a very grave menace.