‘My friend laughed.

‘ “Nonsense; I don’t do the folk down here any harm.”

‘I shook my head doubtfully. There was something sinister and uncivilized about Kelvin. I felt that his mind might run in strange, unrecognized channels.

‘I think I date the beginning of my uneasiness from that moment. I had slept well enough that first night, but the next night my sleep was troubled and broken. Sunday dawned, dark and sullen, with an overcast sky and the threatenings of thunder in the air. I am always a bad hand at hiding my feelings, and Newman noticed the change in me.

‘ “What is the matter with you, West? You are a bundle of nerves this morning.”

‘ “I don’t know,” I confessed, “but I have got a horrible feeling of foreboding.”

‘ “It’s the weather.”

‘ “Yes, perhaps.”

‘I said no more. In the afternoon we went out in Newman’s motor boat, but the rain came on with such vigour that we were glad to return to shore and change into dry clothing.

‘And that evening my uneasiness increased. Outside the storm howled and roared. Towards ten o’clock the tempest calmed down. Newman looked out of the window.

‘ “It is clearing,” he said. “I shouldn’t wonder if it was a perfectly fine night in another half-hour. If so, I shall go out for a stroll.”

‘I yawned. “I am frightfully sleepy,” I said. “I didn’t get much sleep last night. I think that tonight I shall turn in early.”

‘This I did. On the previous night I had slept little. Tonight I slept heavily. Yet my slumbers were not restful. I was still oppressed with an awful foreboding of evil. I had terrible dreams. I dreamt of dreadful abysses and vast chasms, amongst which I was wandering, knowing that a slip of the foot meant death. I waked to find the hands of my clock pointing to eight o’clock. My head was aching badly, and the terror of my night’s dreams was still upon me.

‘So strongly was this so that when I went to the window and drew it up I started back with a fresh feeling of terror, for the first thing I saw, or thought I saw—was a man digging an open grave.

‘It took me a minute or two to pull myself together; then I realized that the grave-digger was Newman’s gardener, and the “grave” was destined to accommodate three new rose trees which were lying on the turf waiting for the moment they should be securely planted in the earth.

‘The gardener looked up and saw me and touched his hat.

‘ “Good morning, sir. Nice morning, sir.”

‘ “I suppose it is,” I said doubtfully, still unable to shake off completely the depression of my spirits.

‘However, as the gardener had said, it was certainly a nice morning. The sun was shining and the sky a clear pale blue that promised fine weather for the day. I went down to breakfast whistling a tune. Newman had no maids living in the house. Two middle-aged sisters, who lived in a farm-house near by, came daily to attend to his simple wants. One of them was placing the coffee-pot on the table as I entered the room.