An hour after the perpetration of the dreadful deed, Philip Fuller trod the sodden path through Thurston Wood, returning from his visit to Sir Harry Elliott’s, after a day spent in copse and covert, and still oppressed and depressed by the remembrances of his morning’s interview with his angry father. With his gun across his shoulder he was rapidly making his way homeward, when his foot struck suddenly against some object in the grass, and he fell at full length across the very spot where, just before, the gun of Bill Buckley had sped its dreadful messenger, and laid his hapless victim low. Wet and muddy, and stained, though he knew it not, with human blood, he rose to his feet, and looking for the obstacle which had tripped him up, he found a gun, and a few yards off, an old black felt cap. Suspicion was now thoroughly aroused. He examined the ground more carefully, detected the hue of blood in the pale moonlight which now and then vanquished the veil of intervening cloud, noticed how the grass and weeds were pressed down to the edge of the stream, and felt that he was gazing on the results of some sad accident or hideous crime. He remembered the fearful scream which he had heard on the still night air. “Murder!” said he, turning sick and trembling with horror at the fearful thought. At that moment a gust of wind blew suddenly, stirring the shrubs and reeds. To his excited mind this was the motion of some living being, his gun dropped from his hand and his first impulse was to turn and flee. Re-assured, he resolved to leave the gun and cap where he had found them, then to hasten to the hall and give the alarm, and bring the servants and a constable to search the spot. Seizing the gun which lay at his feet, Philip ran with speed towards Waverdale Hall. Crossing the park he met Piggy Morris, who was returning from a sale of live stock, and was taking a short cut across Squire Fuller’s park, despite the warning to trespassers, for in that direction there was no right of way. “Don’t go through Thurston Wood!” said Philip, running up to him in hot haste. The ex-farmer, slightly muddled by too long a halt at “The Plough,” did not catch the drift of his expression, but understood him to oppose his passage through the park. Under the influence of a little Dutch courage, he laid hold on Philip to repel what he imagined was a personal attack. A short scuffle succeeded, during which the gun fell to the ground and was seized by Piggy Morris. Philip succeeded in removing his apprehension, and the gun was being handed back, when Morris suddenly exclaimed,-- “This is our Jack’s gun, as sure as eggs is eggs! How have you come by that?” Philip hastily told him what he had seen. Morris listened, thoroughly sobered now, and laying his hand on the young man’s shoulder, he hissed between his set teeth,--