sight of him.

"Oh, Mr. Thaddeus, sir, I am so glad you have come! I am so glad
you have come, Mr. Thaddeus, sir!" We heard her reiterated
rejoicings until the door was closed and her voice died away into
a muffled monotone.

Our guide had left us the lantern. Holmes swung it slowly round,
and peered keenly at the house, and at the great rubbish-heaps
which cumbered the grounds. Miss Morstan and I stood together,
and her hand was in mine. A wondrous subtle thing is love, for
here were we two who had never seen each other before that day,
between whom no word or even look of affection had ever passed,
and yet now in an hour of trouble our hands instinctively sought
for each other. I have marvelled at it since, but at the time it
seemed the most natural thing that I should go out to her so,
and, as she has often told me, there was in her also the instinct
to turn to me for comfort and protection. So we stood hand in
hand, like two children, and there was peace in our hearts for
all the dark things that surrounded us.

"What a strange place!" she said, looking round.

"It looks as though all the moles in England had been let loose
in it. I have seen something of the sort on the side of a hill
near Ballarat, where the prospectors had been at work."

"And from the same cause," said Holmes. "These are the traces of
the treasure-seekers. You must remember that they were six years
looking for it. No wonder that the grounds look like a gravel-