When they were sitting opposite each other at the kitchen table, the man was timid, confiding, humble; but when Mrs. Preedy turned towards the dresser for the sugar basin, there stole into his face the expression I have referred to. What did it denote? Cunning, ferocity, triumph, duplicity. It was but for a moment; upon Mrs. Preedy confronting him again, he relapsed into humbleness and timidity. What was the meaning of this sudden change? That the man was playing a part? Clearly. Then behind his systematic acting was hidden a motive. What motive? He had accepted Mrs. Preedy's invitation to a glass of gin and water, and had asked for sugar. It was while she was getting the sugar that he had allowed the mask to slip from his false face. "If it gets known," she said, "I'm a ruined woman!" "Ah," said Richard Manx, "I comprehend what you mean by ruined. A house with a shadow--a spirit ghost in it, would be--a--horrible! Listen you. This house is likewise." Mrs. Preedy shuddered. "Well," he continued, "I will say--a--nothing." He placed his hand on his heart and leered at her. "On my honour. But be you positive--what I have heard is not--a--fancy. It is veritable." He said a great deal more to the same effect, and I never saw a woman more completely prostrated. Richard Manx speaks imperfect English, and I cannot make up my mind whether he is a Frenchman, or a German, or an Italian, or an Impostor. I am not only suspicious of the man, I am suspicious of his broken English. What I wanted now to ascertain was whether any person had heard the tapping or the scratching in No. 119, and the person I fixed upon to settle this point was Mrs. Bailey, our old lady lodger on the first floor. If anything was going on in the next house it could scarcely have escaped her ears. Yesterday morning while I was tidying up her room, I broached the subject. "I wonder," I said, "whether the next house will ever be let." "_I_ wouldn't take it," said Mrs. Bailey, "if they offered it to me for nothing a-year--eh?" "It wouldn't be a pleasant place to live in certainly," I remarked. "I should be afraid of ghosts." "Do you believe in them, eh, Becky?" "I've never seen one," I replied, "but I can't help believing in them--a little. There's one comfort--they don't trouble people who haven't wronged them. So _we're_ all right." "Yes, Becky, yes--they wouldn't come through brick walls to scare a poor old woman, eh?" "No," I said, "and I've never read of a ghost speaking or making a noise of any kind. Have you?" "Not that I can remember," replied the old lady. "Mrs. Bailey," I said, "since the night of the murder you have not heard anything going on next door?" "Not a sound, Becky. It's been as still as a mouse." "As a mouse," I repeated; "ah, but mice scratch at walls sometimes." "So they do; but there can't be any mice next door, or I should have heard them. Nothing for them to eat, Becky--eh? Mice can't eat ghosts--eh?"