But not for several minutes did the burglar relax his grip of the dead man's throat; and then it dawned upon him that he was a murderer, that in a few short hours justice would be upon his track; and he shuddered with mingled horror and remorse as he mechanically wiped the blade of his knife between his fingers, ere he returned it to its sheath. The man Parsons had been cool and collected enough before, but now he trembled, and he hurried out upon the landing with anxiety, to listen if there was any movement in the house. The struggle had been fierce, but there had been no noise. The murderer was considerably reassured, as he marked the dead silence that reigned in the place, and then he turned again towards the door of the fatal bedroom. He hesitated to enter it, for the wretch, though full of brute courage, feared to look again upon the face of the victim he had done to death. But there was nothing else for it; he entered the room in fear and trepidation, he gathered up his plunder with a shaking hand, and carefully secured it in a Gladstone bag which lay in the dressing-room; on it were the initials of the master of Azalea Lodge. Last of all he thrust the watch and chain of the murdered man into his pocket; then he looked upon the ground and saw with horror the marks of his own guilty foot-prints in hideous red blurs upon the gay carpet. He removed his tell-tale felt slippers, and the bag in one hand, the slippers in the other, and holding the end of the bit of candle which he had re-lighted high above his head, he regained the hall. He carefully placed the little parcel which he had left upon the hall table in the bag, and stuffing a sheep's skin mat and the blood-stained slippers in as well, he succeeded in deadening the jangling noise made by the plate. He snatched down an Inverness cape which hung in the hall and flung it over his arm, and on tiptoe he gained the housemaid's pantry in safety; he put on his boots and washed his blood-stained hands. Then he strode down the garden of Azalea Lodge, carrying in his hand the rope and three-pronged hook by which he had entered the premises. He scaled several walls with cat-like celerity, and then secreted himself among the shrubs of the front garden of a house in a main road of St. John's Wood. From this hiding-place he saw with satisfaction the infrequent policeman pass on his nocturnal round; then he put on the Inverness cape, which gave him a rather distinguished appearance, and walked boldly forth, carrying his Gladstone bag. He hailed the first hansom he met and drove to Charing Cross; there he took another cab to Matilda Street. He dismissed the man at the corner, and reached his lair. Here the man Parsons disappears from our story. Early dawn saw him on board the Antwerp boat, and he reached the Continent in safety. No doubt he had his reward, in this world or the next.