men get after them, we shall soon know what these mysterious fellows
want of me."

In truth I did not take the good soul's excited announcement very
seriously. I added, however, "When I go out, I will watch the people
around me with great care."

"That will be best, sir."

My poor old housekeeper was always frightening herself at nothing.
"If I see them again," she added, "I will warn you before you set
foot out of doors."

"Agreed!" And I broke off the conversation, knowing well that if I
allowed her to run on, she would end by being sure that Beelzebub
himself and one of his chief attendants were at my heels.

The two following days, there was certainly no one spying on me,
either at my exits or entrances. So I concluded my old servant had
made much of nothing, as usual. But on the morning of the
twenty-second of June, after rushing upstairs as rapidly as her age
would permit, the devoted old soul burst into my room and in a half
whisper gasped "Sir! Sir!"

"What is it?"

"They are there!"

"Who?" I queried, my mind on anything but the web she had been
spinning about me.