"But why should you haunt this place at all?" Mr. de Roscovi asked. "What reason is there for your being earth-bound?" "My sins," the control replied. "I was a very wicked girl." "I don't care whether you were wicked or not," Brown put in mournfully. "I want to see you. If your face is in keeping with your limbs and figure, it must indeed be lovely. Is there no way of seeing you--just for a second?" "None," the control answered. Then, with much more emphasis, "None." But hardly had the alleged Anne Heathcote spoken, when far away in the distance came the sound of footsteps. Tap, tap, tap! "Why! By Jove!" Brown shouted, "there she is! I recognise her step. I should know it in a million." For a minute everyone was silent, the tapping growing more and more audible. Then Madame Valenspin, in quite her own voice, exclaimed excitedly: "Let us be going. The spirits tell me we mustn't remain here any longer. Let's go back by the fields." She fumbled with the latchet of the gate, against which she had been leaning, and hurriedly tried to raise it. Mrs. de Roscovi said nothing, but gripped her husband by the arm. The steps approached rapidly, and presently the same dainty form, Brown had previously seen when with Reynolds, once more figured on the horizon. "It is--it is she!" Brown whispered. "Look--the waist, the arms, the hands, the shoes. Silver buckles! How they flash!" An exclamation of horror interrupted him. It was from Mr. de Roscovi. He had moved to one side of the road, dragging his wife with him, and the two were standing huddled together, their eyes fixed in a frenzied stare at the phantom's neck. Brown, forcing his attention away from the long slim hands which so fascinated him, followed their glances. The neck was not as he remembered it, white and slender as far as it went, but it ended abruptly in a grey nothingness, and beyond this nothingness Brown fancied he discerned the dimmest of shadows. He was appalled but fascinated, and intense curiosity far outweighed his fear. He was certain she was beautiful--beautiful to a degree that immeasurably excelled any feminine loveliness he had hitherto encountered. He must see her face. He did not believe her head was missing; he believed it was there on her body right enough, but that for some specific reason it had not materialised. He turned to Madame Valenspin to inquire the cause, and was greatly astonished to see her beating a hasty retreat across the fields. The figure had now come up to where he was standing, and tripping past him, it sped swiftly down the dip. Brown at once gave chase. He had not gone many yards before the darkness of the dip was on him; and the only clue he had to his quarry's whereabouts was the sound of the shoes--the constant tap, tap, tapping. On and on he went, however, and at length, emerging from the darkness, he perceived a wooden stile and beyond it a tiny path, threading its way through a clump of firs that gradually grew thinner