"Did you feel the man's heart?" "No. The sight of the bullet wound under the left eye was enough for me. All I wanted to do was to get away and hide." "Well, then, as you had only a match, and didn't feel the poor man's heart, it's easy to see how you missed the knife wound." Jarman took up the paper again. "The doctor says that Starth was shot first and mutilated afterwards." "But why should the poor wretch have been mutilated at all?" "I can't say. It looks like a piece of savagery to me. Though, to be sure, I think mutilation's a wrong word to be used for a clean stab. If his ears had been cut off now, or--" "Don't!" said Frank, with a shudder. "It's horrible! The man was shot dead, and then stabbed to make sure. That's how I read it." "Well, the person who sent him into the other world must have been anxious to make certain." This time it was Eustace who paced the room. "I only heard of one corpse being treated like that before." "Where was that?" asked Lancaster. "In San Francisco some years ago!" "Who was it, and why was he slain twice--for that's what it amounts to?" Jarman did not answer immediately. It was close on eight o'clock, and he stood looking out of his study window into the luminous night. He and the secretary had been haymaking throughout the afternoon, and the shaven expanse of a particularly rough lawn was dotted with haycocks picturesquely disposed. Beyond was the untrimmed hedge which Jarman could never allow to be cut, and under this grew straggling white rose-bushes, the flowers of which showed starlike in the glimmering light. Over the hedge through a vista of leafy elms could be seen the far-extending country, and the lights of Tilbury in a long line like flying illuminated railway carriages. A clear, starry sky and a yellow harvest moon completed the beauty of the scene, and the nightingales were singing wildly in the copse at the bottom of the meadow. Jarman heaved a sigh of delight. "It's a peaceful scene," said he, with a look of pure pleasure. "Why do I go into gaslight and noisy crowds when I can dwell always in this Arcadia?" "Well, you don't," said Frank, not seeing where this speech would lead to. "You haven't been in a London theatre or drawing-room for ages." "True enough. I keep out of those things. But I was saying that San Francisco was noisy." "Were you? I didn't hear you," said Frank. Then, as Jarman again made no reply, he spoke up rather pettishly. His position didn't soothe his nerves in any way, poor fellow. "You can trust me, Eustace." "How do you know I was becoming confidential?" "Because you talked sentiment about the scene before you." Eustace returned to his seat and laughed rather sadly. "You're an observer, my son," said he. "Yes. You have told me about your past--we must have a repetition of that story some day, for reasons you will easily understand--now I'll tell you my romance." "About a woman?"