I
says to myself 'Squire's seen somebody or something he hadn't no taste
for!' Why, you could read it on his face! plain as print. It was there!"
"Well?" said Copplestone. "And then?"
"Then," continued Spurge. "Then he stood for just a second or two,
looking right and left, up and down. There wasn't a soul in
sight--nobody! But--he slunk off--sneaked off--same as a fox sneaks away
from a farm-yard. He went down the side of the curtain-wall that shuts in
the ruins, taking as much cover as ever he could find--at the end of the
wall, he popped into the wood that stands between the ruins and his
house. And then, of course, I lost all sight of him."
"And--Mr. Oliver?" said Copplestone. "Did you see him again?"
Spurge took a pull at his rum and water, and relighted his pipe.
"I did not," he answered. "I was there until a quarter-past three--then I
went away. And no Oliver had come out o' that door when I left."
CHAPTER X
THE INVALID CURATE
Spurge and his visitor sat staring at each other in silence for a few
minutes; the silence was eventually broken by Copplestone.
"Of course," he said reflectively, "if Mr. Oliver was looking round those
ruins he could easily spend half an hour there."
"Just so," agreed Spurge. "He could spend an hour. If so be as he was one
of these here antiquarian-minded gents, as loves to potter about old
places like that, he could spend two hours, three hours, profitable-like.
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