“It sounds,” I said, “as if the place were a one-patient asylum for a lunatic with long lucid intervals.” “Something like that,” Thwaite answered, “but there seems to be more in it than that. I can’t make all the things I hear fit. Appleshaw said one thing that runs in my head: “Seein’ him in the suds give me a turn.” And Kitworth said once: “It was the bright colors alongside of it that made my blood run cold.” And Appleshaw said more than once, in varying words, but always with the same meaning tone: “You’ll never get over bein’ afraid of him. But you’ll respect him more and more, you’ll almost love him. You won’t fear him for his looks, but for his awful wisdom. He’s that wise, no man is more so.” Once Kitworth answered: “I don’t envy Sturry locked in there with him.” “Sturry nor none of us that’s his most trusted man for the time bein’ is not to be envied,” Appleshaw agreed. “But you’ll come to it, as I have, if you’re the man I take you for.” “That’s about all I got from listening,” Thwaite went on, “the rest I got from watching and scouting. I made sure of the building they call the Pavilion, that’s his usual home. But sometimes he spends his nights in one or the other of the towers, they stand all by themselves. Sometimes the lights are all out after ten o’clock or even nine; then again they’re on till after midnight. Sometimes they come on late, two o’clock or three. I have heard music too, violin music, as Appleshaw described it, and organ music, too; but no howling. He is certainly a lunatic, judging by the statuary.” “Statuary?” I queried. “Yes,” Thwaite said, “statuary. Big figures and groups, all crazy men with heads like elephants or American eagles, perfectly crazy statuary. But all well-done. They stand all about the park. The little, square building between the Pavilion and the green tower is his sculpture studio.” “You seem to know the place mighty well,” I said. “I do,” Thwaite assented, “I’ve gotten to know it well. At first I tried nights like this. Then I dared starlight. Then I dared even moonlight. I’ve never had a scare. I’ve sat on the front steps of the Pavilion at one o’clock of starlight night and never been challenged. I even tried staying in all day, hiding in some bushes, hoping to see him.” “Ever see him?” I inquired. “Never,” Thwaite answered, “I’ve heard him though. He rides horseback after dark. I’ve watched the horse being led up and down in front of the Pavilion, till it got too dark to see it from where I was hid. I’ve heard it pass me in the dark. But I could never get the horse against the sky to see what was on it. Hiding and getting downhill of a road, close to it, don’t go together.” “You didn’t see him the day you spent there?” I insisted.