"Of course I'm not going to pay the least attention," began Clive,
when Dunn interrupted him sharply.

"Hush! hush!" he said sharply. "Crouch down: don't make a sound,
don't stir or move. Hush!"

For Dunn's sharp ear had caught the sound of approaching footsteps
that were drawing quickly nearer, and almost instantly he guessed
who it would be, for there were few pedestrians who came along that
lonely road so late at night.

There were two of them apparently, and at the gate of Bittermeads
they halted.

"Well, good night," said then a voice both Dunn and Clive knew at
once for Deede Dawson's. "That was a pretty check by the knight
I showed you, wasn't it?"

A thin, high, somewhat peculiar voice cursed Deede Dawson, chess,
and the pretty mate by the knight very comprehensively.

"It's young Clive that worries me," said the voice when it had
finished these expressions of disapproval.

"No need," answered Deede Dawson's voice with that strange mirthless
laugh of his. "No need at all; before the week's out he'll trouble
no one any more."

When he heard this, Clive would have betrayed himself by some