developments. But there were none. The fellow sat huddled in a corner,
watching me and keeping an eye on the handle of the alarm over his
head; but he made no sign. When we emerged from the long tunnel he was
as white as a ghost and he hopped out on to Strood platform almost
before the train had begun to slow down.

"I reached my bag down from the rack and got out after him, smiling at
my own folly. The criminal was becoming an obsession of which I must
beware if I would not end my days in an asylum; a fact which was further
impressed on me when I saw my late fellow-passenger, who had just caught
sight of me, 'legging it' down the station approach like a professional
pedestrian and looking back nervously over his shoulder. Resolving
firmly to put the subject out of my mind, I walked slowly into the town
and betook myself to the London Road; and though, as I passed the
Falstaff Inn and crossed Gad's Hill, fleeting reminiscences of Prince
Henry and the men in buckram came unsought, with later suggestions of a
stagecoach struggling up the hill in the dark and masked figures
creeping down the banks into the sunken road, I kept to my good
resolution. The bag was a little cumbersome--it contained a large
parcel of bulbs from Covent Garden that Grayson had asked me to
bring--and yet it was pleasant to break off from the high road and stray
by well-remembered tracks and footpaths across the fields. It was all
familiar ground; for in years gone by, when Grayson was in practice, we
would come down together for weekends to his little demesne, and often I
would stay on alone for a week or so and ramble about the country by
myself. So I knew every inch of the country side and was so much
interested in renewing my acquaintance with it that I was twenty minutes
late for lunch.

"I had a most agreeable day with Grayson (who was working at the