I must have been feeling my way along for some minutes, with a growing sense of the futility of the performance, when I first heard the sharp tinkle of a loose stone on rock. I turned towards the sound and heard it again. Either three or four times I had heard it distinctly when I found myself close to the grass again, only at this place there was a steep little cliff, higher than my head, between it and me, instead of a slope of boulders, so that any one on the bank above would be looking straight down on to me. All this I can swear to. And then when my shoulder was rubbing this low cliff face, I thought--indeed I am sure--I heard something move above, and certainly there was a sharp grating sound on the rock at my back; within an inch of me, it seemed. I looked round quickly just in time to catch a glimpse of something thin and curved and sinister passing upwards, against the night sky. I did not see it descend again, but the next moment came the sharp grating, close to my head this time, and once more the long curved menace passed up, faintly visible against the sky. I did not wait for it to descend again. That somebody was striking at me from above and that I had better get out of the way seemed so evident that I spent no further time in watching the operation. I started from the cliff, my foot struck a patch of seaweed, and with a half smothered "Damn!" I did the next few yards sliding seawards on my side. A peculiarly hard ledge stopped my career and for a moment I lay there wondering what bones were broken. By the time I had found there were none, and scrambled to my feet, the sky line above the bank was clear. Whoever had struck at me was gone and there was not even the slightest sound, save the gurgling of the sea below. And then I gingerly picked my way back. I drew near the turf bank at the top and now again I stopped. Low voices reached my ear distinctly and presently I spied two vague forms standing close together. Before I moved again I had transferred something from my hip pocket to my oilskin jacket and I kept my hand there too, closed upon it and ready. Then I advanced. "Is that you, Mr. Merton?" said a voice I knew. "It is, Mr. Rendall," I answered drily. "Did you see anybody?" "No," I answered truthfully. "We thought we heard a cry," said Miss Jean. "I may have startled a sea gull," I suggested; and then I asked with a sharpness in my voice I could not quite control, "Where did Mr. Rendall spring from?" "I told you I thought we should meet him," she answered, with a cool note in her voice that countered mine. "What a curious chance that we should all meet here!" I exclaimed. "It is precisely what I expected," said she. "Did you think then it was Mr. Rendall down among the rocks?" I enquired. "No," she said, "and it wasn't." "Oh," I replied in a tone which (if I achieved my intention) might have meant anything--or nothing.