When I stood up _he_ stood up, too, and looked down at me. "It is worth while having been a brute and a villain," he said soberly, "to hear that. I am not under arrest or going to be. The fact is that two entirely different and--if you will forgive me--nefarious schemes have been under way at the same time, and the lines crossed. You and I got tangled in them and nearly submerged. But that was not accident; it was destiny." He took my other hand. At that absorbing moment the footman announced cautiously that the motor was at the door. It was horribly disappointing. From destiny to motor wraps is such a descent. "Do we have to go right away?" I said. VIII It was just dawn when we started, one of the grey dawns that have a suggestion of pink, like a smoke-coloured chiffon over a rose foundation. The rain was over, and down in the valley below us lay shadowy white lakes of mist. I threw back my head and took a great breath. "How beautiful!" I said. And he repeated, "Beautiful!" But he looked directly at me. I had a queer, thrilly feeling in the back of my neck. And then we were flying down the hillside we had climbed so painfully the night before, and were dipping into the mist pools. Here and there grey shadows moved under the trees and resolved themselves first into rocks and then into sheep. (My descriptions are improving.) And as we went along he told me the story. It seems he had come back from America for a visit, and on the second day of his stay the Wimberley Romney had been stolen by an expert picture thief posing as a tourist. He had caught a glimpse of the visitor, so when the Romney was missed he started out at once on the search, taking a motor cycle. The whole countryside was roused, and three detectives came down from London. But he had an idea that he would find his man somewhere on the moor, and he had lost himself there. After a night under a rock he had found a cottage and got his bearings. But the rain kept him there. He had got as far as Harcourt Hall when another storm came up. To his surprise he found the place almost in decay, but the house open. He went in, dropped asleep in the morning-room on a divan, wakened by hearing me pass within a foot of where he lay, and followed me. When I threw my necklace at him, at first he was puzzled and amused. Later, he kept it deliberately.