Thoburn was going around with a watch in his hand, and Mr. Sam was for
killing him and burying the body in the snow.

At half past five I just about gave up. I was sitting in front of the
fire wondering why I'd taken influenza the spring before from getting my
feet wet in a shower, when I had been standing in a mineral spring for
so many years that it's a wonder I'm not web-footed. It was when I had
influenza that the old doctor made the will, you remember. Maybe I was
crying, I don't recall.

It was dark outside, and nothing inside but firelight. Suddenly I seemed
to feel somebody looking at the back of my neck and I turned around.
There was a man standing outside one of the windows, staring in.

My first thought, of course, was that it was Mr. Dick, but just as the
face vanished I saw that it wasn't. It was older by three or four years
than Mr. Dick's and a bit fuller.

I'm not nervous. I've had to hold my own against chronic grouches too
long to have nerves, so I went to the door and looked out. The man
came around the corner just then and I could see him plainly in the
firelight. He was covered with snow, and he wore a sweater and no
overcoat, but he looked like a gentleman.

"I beg your pardon for spying," he said, "but the fire looked so snug!
I've been trying to get to the hotel over there, but in the dark I've
lost the path."

"That's not a hotel," I snapped, for that touched me on the raw. "That's
Hope Springs Sanatorium, and this is one of the Springs."