"The body?" Mr. Pope shivered. "God knows. That, my dear Commandant, is the cruellest part of the mystery--at least, according to Sam Leggo. It appears that Sir Caesar, Leggo and Eli Tregarthen were at North Inniscaw this afternoon, taking stock of the farm, which Sir Caesar was persuading Tregarthen to rent. Tregarthen was sullen--you may have heard that he resents being given notice to quit his holding on Saaron. In the end, on some chance word of Sir Caesar's he blazed up, completely lost control of himself, and used threats of personal violence. Leggo will swear to this; but it is immaterial, for I myself have heard him indulge in similar threats, and so has Abe, the gardener. Well, Tregarthen swung off in a huff, took his way down across Pare Coppa--it was there, just under the Cam, that the outbreak occurred--apparently for the landing-quay by the school, where his boat lay. He left Sir Caesar and Sam Leggo standing there." "At what time?" "The time, according to Leggo, was close upon sunset. Sir Caesar--as his habit is--carried a gun under his arm; but whether or not the gun was loaded Leggo is unable to say. After expressing surprise at Tregarthen's display of temper, Sir Caesar turned the conversation upon an old adit which lies under the seaward face of the Cam, and leads (I am assured) down to Ogo Vean. Its existence is known to very few--and Leggo was surprised to hear him mention it; but it now appears that he had learnt of it this very afternoon, in casual talk with old Abe. He desired then and there to explore it, and--having examined the entrance--either because the adit itself is dark, or as a precaution in the gathering dusk, he sent Leggo back to the farmhouse to fetch a lantern. Leggo declares that it took him less than fifteen minutes to reach the farm, find the lantern, and return with it to the lower gate of Parc Coppa; also that he used his best speed because the dusk was gathering. As he reached the gate he heard a shot from somewhere on the edge of the cliffs. This did not perturb him, for he supposed that the Lord Proprietor was potting at a stray rabbit. As he climbed the field, however, towards the Carn, on the summit of which he had left Sir Caesar seated, he saw three small children running along the cliffs to his left, making for the slope towards the landing-quay, and recognised them for Tregarthen's three children. He called to them to stop, for they seemed to be running in a panic. If they heard, they did not obey, but ran down the hill out of sight. By this--and because he could not see Sir Caesar on the summit of the Carn--he began to grow alarmed, lit the candle within his lantern (for it was now nearly dark), and shouted. He received no answer. He ran to the edge of the Carn, climbed down thence to the mouth of the adit, and--finding no trace of his master--began to hunt, still shouting, along the cliffs to the left, in the direction where he had first spied the children. To cut his story