DR. DAMAR GREEFE


As the crow flies Friar's Park was less than two miles from the Abbey
Inn; but the road, which according to a sign-board led "to
Hainingham," followed a tortuous course through the valley, and when
at last I came to what I assumed to be the gate-lodge, a thunderous
ebony cloud crested the hill-top above, and its edge, catching the
burning rays of the sun, glowed fiercely like the pall of Avalon in
the torchlight. Through the dense ranks of firs cloaking the slopes a
breeze presaging the coming storm whispered evilly, and here in the
hollow the birds were still.

I stared rather blankly at the ivy-covered lodge, which, if
appearances were to be trusted, was unoccupied. But I pushed open the
iron gate and tugged at a ring which was suspended from the wall. A
discordant clangor rewarded my efforts, the cracked note of a bell
which spoke from somewhere high up in the building, that seemed to be
buffeted to and fro from fir to fir, until it died away, mournfully,
in some place of shadows far up the slope.

In the voice of the bell there was something lonesome, something akin
to the atmosphere of desertion which seemed to lie upon the whole
neighborhood--something fearful, too, as though the bell would
whisper: "Return! Beware of disturbing the dwellers in this place."

The house, one wing of which I have said was visible from the inn
window, could not be seen at all from the gate. Indeed I had lost
sight of it at the moment that I had set out and had never obtained a