And the more I studied it, the less absurd it seemed, not by the light
of reason, but by the feeling of pure intuition. I knew it as sanely as
I knew that the moon made that patch of light through the window. The
man to whom that other note had been surreptitiously conveyed by the
sad-eyed, beautiful girl of the iron-barred chamber was dead; and he was
dead because Old Man Hooper had so willed. And the former owners of the
other notes of the "Collection" concerning which the old man had spoken
were dead, too--dead for the same reason and by the same hidden hands.

Why? Because they knew about the girl? Unlikely. Without doubt Hooper
had, as in my case, himself made possible that knowledge. But I
remembered many things; and I knew that my flash of intuition, absurd as
it might seem at first sight, was true. I recalled the swift, darting
onslaughts with the fly whackers, the fierce, vindictive slaughter of
the frogs, his early-morning pursuit of the flock of migrating birds.
Especially came clear to my recollection the words spoken at breakfast:

"Everything inside the walls is mine! Mine! Mine! Understand? I will
not tolerate anything that is not mine; that does not obey my will; that
does not come when I say come; go when I say go; and fall silent when I
say be still!"

My crime, the crime of these men from whose dead hands the girl's
appeals had been taken for the "Collection," was that of curiosity! The
old man would within his own domain reign supreme, in the mental as in
the physical world. The chance cowboy, genuinely desirous only of a
resting place for the night, rode away unscathed; but he whom the old
man convicted of a prying spirit committed a lese-majesty that could not
be forgiven. And I had made many tracks during my night reconnaissance.