“The real cause of her death was never known, but I obtained evidence to show that on the night after the wing of a bat had been attached to her hut, she wandered out in her sleep and visited the Black Belt. Can you doubt that someone was calling her?” “Calling her?” “Mr. Harley, she was obeying the call of M’kombo!” “The _call_ of M’kombo? You refer to some kind of hypnotic suggestions?” “I illustrate,” replied the Colonel, “to help to make clear something which I have to tell you. On the night when last the moon was full--on the night after someone had entered the house--I had retired early to bed. Suddenly I awoke, feeling very cold. I awoke, I say, and where do you suppose I found myself?” “I am all anxiety to hear.” “On the point of entering the Tudor garden--you call it Tudor garden?--which is visible from the window of your room!” “Most extraordinary,” murmured Harley; “and you were in your night attire?” “I was.” “And what had awakened you?” “An accident. I believe a lucky accident. I had cut my bare foot upon the gravel and the pain awakened me.” “You had no recollection of any dream which had prompted you to go down into the garden?” “None whatever.” “Does your room face in that direction?” “It does not. It faces the lake on the south of the house. I had descended to a side door, unbarred it, and walked entirely around the east wing before I awakened.” “Your room faces the lake,” murmured Harley. “Yes.” Their glances met, and in Paul Harley’s expression there seemed to be a challenge. “You have not yet told me,” said he, “the name of your neighbour.” Colonel Menendez lighted his new cigarette. “Mr. Harley,” he confessed, “I regret that I ever referred to this suspicion of mine. Indeed it is hardly a suspicion, it is what I may call a desperate doubt. Do you say that, a desperate doubt?” “I think I follow you,” said Harley. “The fact is this, I only know of one person within ten miles of Cray’s Folly who has ever visited Cuba.” “Ah.” “I have no other scrap of evidence to associate him I with my shadowy enemy. This being so, you will pardon me if I ask you to forget that I ever referred to his existence.” He spoke the words with a sort of lofty finality, and accompanied them with a gesture of the hands which really left Harley no alternative but to drop the subject. Again their glances met, and it was patent to me that underlying all this conversation was something beyond my ken. What it was that Harley suspected I could not imagine, nor what it was that Colonel Menendez desired to conceal; but tension was in the very air. The Spaniard was on the defensive, and Paul Harley was puzzled, irritated.