"Will he, I wonder?" thought the police officer, and he set to work upon
the treadmill of his thoughts again.

There is nothing in the world so tantalizing, and so hard to bear, as
the conviction that knowledge is just within reach and that it is
deliberately withheld. Heath stood between him and elucidation, and the
more firmly the clergyman held his ground, and the more definitely he
blocked the path, the more sure Hartley became that he did so of set
purpose.

"But _why_, _why_?" he asked himself, as he drove through the Cantonment
towards Mrs. Wilder's bungalow.

Atkins got off his bicycle and handed it over to his boy as he arrived
at the dreary entrance.

"The Padré Sahib is out?" he said, in his brisk, matter-of-fact tones.

"The Padré Sahib is upstairs," said the boy, with an immovable face; and
Atkins went up quickly.

"Hallo, Heath, I met Hartley just now, and he said you were out."

Heath looked up from a sheet of paper laid out on the writing-table
before him.

"I did not feel up to seeing Hartley," he said, a little stiffly. "It is
not a convenient hour for callers, so I availed myself of an excuse."

"He told me to tell you that it was rather a pressing matter that