When night fell it was dark, cold, and raw, with a nasty wind blowing, and I found the draughty arbour none too cosy for my liking, but I stayed there for upwards of an hour in the belief that something was going to turn up. Meanwhile half a gale whistled through leafless branches and howled round the crevasses and protuberances of the rocky background. Just as I was on the point of quitting I observed a faint flicker of light upon the blind of my room, and I knew that evil agents were abroad. An attempt to ascend the stairway behind a couple of other visitors whereby I could gain my apartment unobserved was frustrated by the stout lady before mentioned. She, by an extraordinary coincidence, started to come downstairs just as my foot had gained the last step of the ascent. In her haste she jostled first one and then the other of the gentlemen meeting her, for which she apologised most profusely and in a loud, jovial, bantering manner. I leaned against the wall and laughed. It was my custom to take everything as it came, never to meet trouble half-way by worrying, and even to attempt the credit of gaining happiness under almost impossible conditions. In the present instance the fortune of war favoured me, although conditions were adverse. A large mirror hung upon the landing, the reflection field of which embraced wide angles. I, happening to glance upwards and beyond the little pleasantries going on above, observed a shadow darken the surface of the glass, but the noise made by the merry-makers on the stairhead prevented any slighter sounds from being heard. Later on, when I had entered and was alone within the privacy of my own apartment, examining the test traps at my leisure, all possible doubt of an interest having been taken in my belongings was removed. What would happen next? The veiled secret warning that had been given me portended mischief. It was hardly reasonable to suppose one's natural enemy would take a knock-down blow without reprisals. They were more than hinted at in the urgent message I had received. I was not deceived for one moment. I felt myself within the claws of the pincers and it was up to me to wriggle out before they could be closed. There must be no hesitation, no delay, and no "wait and see" about my decisions. I must quit, and that at once, or the worst might befall. Having supped in the restaurant common to all guests of the hostelry, I retired early, but instead of undressing I lay upon the outside of the bed and smoked and read until the early hours of the morning, between whiles turning over many matters of more or less moment in my mind.