I reviewed carefully my whole acquaintance with Vernon, but especially the latter part of my acquaintance with him, when Deeming was in relation with us both. It was then, when Deeming came into his life, and only then, that Vernon had shown me for the first time a man in him whose presence I had not suspected, whose exact nature I did not know. This man was roused by Deeming. I should have let him sleep. But, having been roused, he had surely been sleepless ever since. Yes, that was so. Thus far, things were clear to me. Something—the strange man in Vernon—had been wakeful, ardent ever since, was wakeful, ardent now. This man it was who worked shoulder to shoulder with Gernham. This man it was who had bought the black spaniel. So far, light. But now came the darkness. What had been Vernon’s purpose in buying the black spaniel? When he saw it he had looked at it fatally. At that moment, while he looked at it, his purpose had sprung up full-grown in his mind, full-grown and fierce. I was not to know that purpose. Arthur Gernham was not to know it. He now had some purpose in connection with an animal that Arthur Gernham, his close friend and colleague, his leader in a campaign of kindness, of pity, to which he was dedicating all his activities and giving all his enthusiasm, was not to know or even suspect. That purpose, since it was in connection with an animal, must surely be one of kindness, of pity. But here my instinct rebelled violently against my knowledge of Vernon. My instinct said that it was not so; that Vernon’s purpose in buying the black spaniel had been sad, even perhaps terrible. Yet how could that be? The dog’s eyes haunted me. They seemed to me to know what I did not know, to know what Vernon’s purpose was. Deeming—again I thought of him, of Vernon’s short and strange connection with him. Once Vernon had said to me that he believed Deeming was a man haunted by a mania for persecution. He had spoken without knowledge then. Later, he had travelled to England to gain knowledge. He had taken the house in Wimpole Street to gain knowledge. Had he gained it? I did not know. Vernon had never told me. Was that why I was in the dark now? It began to seem to me that, perhaps, if I could find out what Vernon knew of Deeming I should understand something of his present purpose, of his purpose in buying the black spaniel. At this stage in my mental debate I reached the Piccadilly corner of Albemarle Street, and was just going to turn towards my house, when a familiar face, a face respectable, close-shaven, English, looked upon me in the lamplight, and a bowler hat was deferentially lifted. “Cragg!” I said. “Good-night, Sir,” said Cragg. “A fine night, Sir.” “Yes—wait a minute, Cragg.” “Certainly, Sir.” Vernon’s man stood still. “Just walk with me to my door, will you?” “With pleasure, Sir.” We turned side by side into the comparative quiet of Albemarle Street. “How is Mr. Kersteven, Cragg?”