Now, under ordinary circumstances Bunting would have rushed forward
to drive out whoever was there. He and his wife had often had
trouble, before the cold weather began, with vagrants seeking shelter
there. But to-night he stayed outside, listening intently, sick
with suspense and fear.

Was it possible that their place was being watched--already? He
thought it only too likely. Bunting, like Mrs. Bunting, credited
the police with almost supernatural powers, especially since he
had paid that visit to Scotland Yard.

But to Bunting's amazement, and, yes, relief, it was his lodger who
suddenly loomed up in the dim light.

Mr. Sleuth must have been stooping down, for his tall, lank form
had been quite concealed till he stepped forward from behind the
low wall on to the flagged path leading to the front door.

The lodger was carrying a brown paper parcel, and, as he walked
along, the new boots he was wearing creaked, and the tap-tap of
hard nail-studded heels rang out on the flat-stones of the narrow
path.

Bunting, still standing outside the gate, suddenly knew what it was
his lodger had been doing on the other side of the low wall. Mr.
Sleuth had evidently been out to buy himself another pair of new
boots, and then he had gone inside the gate and had put them on,
placing his old footgear in the paper in which the new pair had
been wrapped.