"Exactly as I always leave it, sir. There was nothing the matter with it then. Drew--I saw him outside, didn't I? Step here, Drew. You were with me when I locked up the greenhouse last night. Did you see anything wrong with it?" "It were right enough then," answered Drew. Monk turned himself about, lifting his hands in dismay, as one blackened object after another came under view. "I never saw such a thing!" he cried piteously. "There has been something wrong at work here; or else----" Monk came to a sudden pause. "Or else what?" asked the Squire. "Or else, moving the plants into the hall on Tuesday has killed them." "Moving the plants wouldn't kill them. What are you thinking of, Monk?" "_Moving_ them would not kill them, sir, or hurt them either," returned Monk, with a stress on the first word; "but it might have been the remote cause of it." "I don't understand you!" "I saw some result of the sort once, sir. It was at a gentleman's place at Chiswick. All the choice plants were taken indoors to improvise a kind of conservatory for a night fête. They were carried back the next day, seemingly none the worse, and on the morrow were found withered." "Like these?" "No, sir, not so bad as these. They didn't die; they revived after a time. A great fuss was made over it; the gentleman thought it must be wilful damage, and offered twenty pounds reward for the discovery of the offenders. At last it was found they had been poisoned by the candles." "Poisoned by the candles!" "A new sort of candle, very beautiful to look at, but with a great quantity of arsenic in it," continued Monk. "A scientific man gave it as his opinion that the poison thrown out from the candles had been fatal to the plants. Perhaps something of the same kind has done the mischief here, sir. Plants are such delicate things!" "And what has been fatal to the grapes? _They_ were not taken into the house." The question came from the surgeon, Mr. Duffham. He had stood all the while against the end of the far steps, looking fixedly at Monk over the top of his cane. Monk put his eyes on the grapes above, and kept them there while he answered. "True, sir; the grapes, as you say, didn't go in. Perhaps the poison brought back by the plants may have acted on them." "Now, I tell you what, Monk, I think that's all nonsense," cried the Squire, testily. "Well, sir, I don't see any other way of accounting for this state of things." "The greenhouse was filled with some suffocating, smelling, blasting stuff that knocked me back'ards," put in Jenkins. "Every crack and crevice was stopped where a breath of air could have got in. I wish it had been you to find it; you'd not have liked to be smothered alive, I know." "I wish it had been," said Monk. "If there was any such thing here, and not your fancy, I'll be bound I'd have traced it out." "Oh, would you! Did you do anything to them there pot-stands?" continued Jenkins, pointing to them. "No." "Oh! Didn't clean 'em out?"