"Cause I've had many a sixpenn'orth of him at both Northborough and Norcaster," answered Spurge. "Seen him a dozen times, I have, and knew him well enough, even if I'd only viewed him from the the-ayter gallery. Well, he come along up the path from the south quay. He passed within a dozen yards of me, and went up to the door in the wall of the ruins, right opposite where I was lying doggo amongst some bushes. He poked the door with the point of his stick--it was ajar, that door, and it went open. And so he walks in--and disappears. Guv'nor!--I reckon that'ud be the last time as he was seen alive!--unless--unless--" "Unless--what?" asked Copplestone eagerly. "Unless one other man saw him," replied Spurge solemnly. "For there was another man there, guv'nor. Squire Greyle!" Copplestone looked hard at Spurge; Spurge returned the stare, and nodded two or three times. "Gospel truth!" he said. "I kept where I was--I'd reasons of my own. May be eight minutes or so--certainly not ten--after Bassett Oliver walked in there, Squire Greyle walked out. In a hurry, guv'nor. He come out quick. He looked a bit queer. Dazed, like. You know how quick a man can think, guv'nor, under certain circumstances? I thought quicker'n lightning. I says to myself 'Squire's seen somebody or something he hadn't no taste for!' Why, you could read it on his face! plain as print. It was there!" "Well?" said Copplestone. "And then?" "Then," continued Spurge. "Then he stood for just a second or two, looking right and left, up and down. There wasn't a soul in sight--nobody! But--he slunk off--sneaked off--same as a fox sneaks away from a farm-yard. He went down the side of the curtain-wall that shuts in the ruins, taking as much cover as ever he could find--at the end of the wall, he popped into the wood that stands between the ruins and his house. And then, of course, I lost all sight of him." "And--Mr. Oliver?" said Copplestone. "Did you see him again?" Spurge took a pull at his rum and water, and relighted his pipe. "I did not," he answered. "I was there until a quarter-past three--then I went away. And no Oliver had come out o' that door when I left." CHAPTER X THE INVALID CURATE Spurge and his visitor sat staring at each other in silence for a few minutes; the silence was eventually broken by Copplestone. "Of course," he said reflectively, "if Mr. Oliver was looking round those ruins he could easily spend half an hour there."