"You ought to be," said he. "You've got some wit. Damn the English, and double-damn the Scotch! Well we're evidently both going in the other direction, so good-bye to you!" What was I to make of this? What was to be thought of the whole morning's adventure? Only one thing was perfectly clear to me: that I had a very dangerous, very determined, and very artful enemy in this island--or, almost certainly, several enemies, and that instead of the hunter I had become the hunted. They might fear me but they certainly did not fear to attack me whether by day or night. Had I sat down behind that trellis-like wall as I intended, I shivered a little to think of my fate. I should have been shot at twelve inches range, and that would have been the end of my spy hunt. I began to realise that it was much longer odds on my being dead within the next forty-eight hours than on my getting on the traces of that oilskinned man. And then as I was walking back thinking these none too cheery thoughts, something put the parachute into my head. I had not thought of it before since the first night when I hid it. It took me a little time to get my bearings, but I found my way to the clover field at last and then made for the low wall with the bed of rank grass and docken leaves beneath it. I hunted up that wall and down that wall, but never a sign of the parachute was there. "That is how they've bowled me out!" I said to myself. "They have heard by this time of the missing balloon; then they found the parachute, saw that the dates coincided, and spotted me!" XII THE KEY TURNED When I got back I felt very little inclined for society. I passed through the hall as quietly as I could, went straight up to my room, and heaved a sigh of relief when the door was safely shut behind me. Perhaps my adventures had been following a little too quickly on the heels of one another; anyhow it was quiet which I craved at that moment. It was a reposeful room, scented with honeysuckle, and for a few minutes I enjoyed an unwonted sensation of peace; and then my eyes chanced to fall on the chest of drawers. I stared for a moment and then bent over the lock of the upper drawer, that drawer which concealed the mythical uniform coat with the important mythical papers in the pocket. There could not be a shadow of doubt as to what had happened. The lock had been taken off and put in again since I last saw it. And now of course my hosts knew as well as I did that no uniform coat had ever lain there, and consequently that their guest had never worn one. I had meant to slack, but this situation obviously required some thinking over, so I lit a pipe, threw myself down on the bed, and began.