As the twilight approached, making my work in the library impossible, and having no wish to go on with it by artificial light, I went out for a walk. The fascination which is invariably exercised on any of us by such affairs led me, half-unconsciously, to the scene of the murder. The tide, which had been up in the morning, was now out, though just beginning to turn again, and the beach, with its masses of bare rock and wide-spreading deposits of sea-weed, looked bleak and desolate in the uncertain grey light. But it was not without life--two men were standing near the place where I had come upon Salter Quick's dead body. Going nearer to them, I recognized one as Claigue, the landlord of the Mariner's Joy. He recognized me at the same time, and touched his cap with a look that was alike knowing and confidential. "So it came about as I'd warned him, sir!" he said, without preface. "I told him how it would be. You heard me! A man carrying gold about him like that!--and showing it to all and sundry. Why, he was asking for trouble!" "The gold was found on him," I answered. "And his watch and other things. He wasn't murdered for his property." Claigue uttered a sharp exclamation. He was evidently taken aback. "You hadn't heard that, then?" I suggested. "No," he replied. "I hadn't heard that, sir. Bless me! his money and valuables found on him. No! we've heard naught except that he was found murdered, here, early this morning. Of course, I concluded that it had been for the sake of his money--that he'd been pulling it out in some public-house or other, and had been followed. Dear me! that puts a different complexion on things. Now, what's the meaning of it, in your opinion, sir?" "I have none," I answered. "The whole thing's a mystery--so far. But, as you live hereabouts, perhaps you can suggest something. The doctors are of the opinion that he was murdered--here--yesterday evening: that his body had been lying here, just above high-water mark, since, probably, eight or nine o'clock last night. Now, what could he be doing down at this lonely spot? He went inland when he left your house." The man who was with Claigue offered an explanation. There was, he said, a coast village or two further along the headlands; it would be a short cut to them to follow the beach. "Yes," said I, "but that would argue that he knew the lie of the land. And, according to his own account, he was a complete stranger." "Aye!" broke in Claigue. "But he wasn't alone, sir, when he came here! He'd fallen in with somebody, somewhere, that brought him down here--and left him, dead. And--who was it?"