course, Penrose, believe the story?"

"I do," said Mr. Penrose composedly. "I believe that a devil carried him
off, and that its name was _delirium tremens_. We can guess, can't we,
Irechester, why he smashed or burnt everything, and fled in mad terror
into the darkness? Where to? Was he drowned at sea, or did he take his
life, or did he rot to death in some filthy hole? Nobody knows. But the
grave he dug is there in the Tower, unless it's been filled up since old
Saffron has lived there."

"Why in the world wasn't it filled up before?" asked Alec Naylor with a
laugh. "People lived in the cottage, didn't they?"

"I've visited the cottage often," Irechester interposed, "when various
people had it, but I never saw any signs of the Tower being used."

"It never was, I'm sure; and as for the grave, well, Alec, in country
parts, to this day, you'd be thought a bold man if you filled up a grave
that your neighbor had dug for himself, and such a neighbor as Captain
Duggle! He might take it into his head some night to visit it, and if he
found it filled up there'd be trouble, nasty trouble!" His laugh cackled
out rather uncomfortably. Gertie shivered, and one of the subalterns
gulped down his port.

"Old Saffron's a man of education, I believe. No doubt he pays no heed to
such nonsense, and has had the thing covered up," said Naylor.

"As to that I don't know. Perhaps you do, Irechester? He's your patient,
isn't he?"