Tony West told him he was getting morbid about it, and to have a change.

“Come up to London and see some of your friends,” was West’s advice.  But Merriton never took it.

’Toinette seemed the only person who understood how he felt, and the knowledge of this only served to draw them closer together.  She, too, felt that marriage was for the time being unthinkable, and despite Brellier’s constant urging in that direction, she held her ground firmly, telling him that they preferred to wait awhile.

“I’m going to solve the blessed thing, ’Toinette,” Nigel told her over and over again during these long weeks and days that followed, “if I grow gray-headed in the attempt.  Dacre Wynne was no true friend of mine, but he was my guest at the time of his disappearance, and I mean to find the reason of it.”

If he had only known what the future held in store for them both, would he still have clung to his purpose?  Who can tell?

It was at night that the thing obsessed him worst.  When darkness had fallen Merriton would sit, evening after evening, looking out upon that same scene that he had shown his companions that eventful night.  And always the flames danced on their maddening way, mocking him, holding behind the screen of their brilliancy the key to Dacre Wynne’s inexplicable disappearance.  Merriton would sit and watch them for hours, and sometimes find himself talking to them.

What was the matter with him?  Was he going insane?  Or was this Dacre Wynne’s abominable idea of a revenge for having stolen ’Toinette’s heart away from him?  To have died and sent his spirit back to haunt the man he hated seemed to Merriton sometimes the answer to the questions which constantly puzzled him.

CHAPTER IX

THE SECOND VICTIM

The alterations at Merriton Towers were certainly a success, from the builder’s point of view at any rate.  White paint had helped to dispel some of its gloominess, though there were whose who said that the whole place was ruined thereby.  However, it was certainly an improvement to be able to have windows that opened, and to look into rooms that beckoned you with promises of cozy inglenooks, and plenty of brilliant sunshine.

Borkins looked upon these improvements with a censorious eye.  He was one of those who believed in “lettin’ things be”; to whom innovation is a crime, and modernity nothing short of madness.  To him the dignity of the house had gone.  But when it came to Nigel installing a new staff of servants, the good Borkins literally threw up his hands and cried aloud in anguish.  He did not hold with frilled aprons, any more than he held with woman assuming places that were not meant for them.

But if the maids annoyed Borkins, his patience reached its breaking point when Merriton—­paying a flying visit to town—­returned in company with a short, thickset person, who spoke with a harsh, cockney accent, and whom Merriton introduced as his “batman”, “Whatever that might be,” said Borkins, holding forth to Dimmock, one of the under-grooms.  James Collins soon became a necessary part of the household machinery, a little cog in fact upon which the great wheel of tragedy was soon to turn.