Thereafter, when I had despatched Gillespie to the village in the dog-cart, I got into my leggings, reflecting upon the odd circumstance that Helen Holbrook had been able to speak to me over the telephone a few minutes before, using an instrument that had, by Sister Margaret's testimony, been out of commission for several days. The girl had undoubtedly slipped away from St. Agatha's and spoken to me from some other house in the neighborhood; but this was a matter of little importance, now that I had undertaken her commission. The chapel clock chimed nine as I gained the road, and I walked my horse to scan St. Agatha's windows through vistas that offered across the foliage. And there, by the open window of her aunt's sitting-room, I saw Helen Holbrook reading. A table-lamp at her side illumined her slightly bent head; and, as though aroused by my horse's quick step in the road, she rose and stood framed against the light, with the soft window draperies fluttering about her. I spoke to my horse and galloped toward Red Gate. CHAPTER XVI AN ODD AFFAIR AT RED GATE Brother, you have a vice of mercy in you, Which better fits a lion than a man. --_Troilus and Cressida_. As I rode through Port Annandale the lilting strains of a waltz floated from the casino, and I caught a glimpse of the lake's cincture of lights. My head was none too clear from its crack on the cabin floor, and my chest was growing sore and stiff from the slash of the Italian's knife; but my spirits were high, and my ears rang with memories of the Voice. Helen had given me a commission, and every fact of my life faded into insignificance compared to this. The cool night air rushing by refreshed me. I was eager for the next turn of the wheel, and my curiosity ran on to the boat-maker's house. I came now to a lonely sweep, where the road ran through a heavy woodland, and the cool, moist air of the forest rose round me. The lake, I knew, lay close at hand, and the Hartridge cottage was not, as I reckoned my distances, very far ahead. I had drawn in my horse to consider the manner of my approach to the boat-maker's, and was jogging along at an easy trot when a rifle-shot rang out on my left, from the direction of the creek, and my horse shied sharply and plunged on at a wild gallop. He ran several hundred yards before I could check him, and then I turned and rode slowly back, peering into the forest's black shadow for the foe. I paused and waited, with the horse dancing crazily beneath me, but the woodland presented an inscrutable front. I then rode on to the unfenced strip of wood where I had left my horse before.