I wondered what the colonel would say. Simple and hearty, as a general rule, he had a hot temper on occasions, and it made me ill as I thought, would he and, worse still, would _Lilian_ believe it was really an accident? They knew what an interest I had in silencing the deceased poodle--would they believe the simple truth? I vowed that they _should_ believe me. My genuine remorse and the absence of all concealment on my part would speak powerfully for me. I would choose a favourable time for my confession; that very evening I would tell all. Still I shrank from the duty before me, and, as I knelt down sorrowfully by the dead form and respectfully composed his stiffening limbs, I thought that it was unjust of fate to place a well-meaning man, whose nerves were not of iron, in such a position. Then, to my horror, I heard a well-known ringing tramp on the road outside, and smelled the peculiar fragrance of a Burmese cheroot. It was the colonel himself, who had been taking out the doomed Bingo for his usual evening run. I don’t know how it was, exactly, but a sudden panic came over me. I held my breath, and tried to crouch down unseen behind the laurels; but he had seen me, and came over at once to speak to me across the hedge. He stood there, not two yards from his favourite’s body! Fortunately it was unusually dark that evening. “Ha, there you are, eh!” he began, heartily; “don’t rise, my boy, don’t rise.” I was trying to put myself in front of the poodle, and did not rise--at least, only my hair did. “You’re out late, ain’t you?” he went on; “laying out your garden, hey?” I could not tell him that I was laying out his poodle! My voice shook as, with a guilty confusion that was veiled by the dusk, I said it was a fine evening--which it was not. “Cloudy, sir,” said the colonel, “cloudy; rain before morning, I think. By the way, have you seen anything of Bingo in here?” This was the turning-point. What I _ought_ to have done was to say mournfully, “Yes, I’m sorry to say I’ve had a most unfortunate accident with him. Here he is; the fact is, I’m afraid I’ve _shot_ him!” But I couldn’t. I could have told him at my own time, in a prepared form of words--but not then. I felt I must use all my wits to gain time, and fence with the questions. “Why,” I said, with a leaden airiness, “he hasn’t given you the slip, has he?” “Never did such a thing in his life!” said the colonel, warmly; “he rushed off after a rat or a frog or something a few minutes ago, and as I stopped to light another cheroot I lost sight of him. I thought I saw him slip in under your gate, but I’ve been calling him from the front there and he won’t come out.” No, and he never _would_ come out any more. But the colonel must not be told that just yet. I temporised again: “If,” I said, unsteadily--“if he had slipped in under the gate I should have seen him. Perhaps he took it into his head to run home?”