could look out, without raising his head from the pillow, over the court
in the rear of the Inn and into the misty depths of Lovel's Woods beyond
the offices and stables.

As he lay half-consciously musing--it must have been near midnight--his
attention was suddenly riveted upon the court below. It seemed to him
that he heard footsteps. He was instantly wide awake, and jumped from the
bed to the window, whence he peered from behind the curtain into the
courtyard. Close to the wall of the Inn, directly beneath the window, a
shadow flitted on the moonlight-flooded pavement, and he could hear the
crumbling of the snow. Cautiously he thrust his head out of the window.
Moving rapidly along near to the house, was a little figure wrapped in a
dark cloak, which looked to Tom for all the world like the Marquis de
Boisdhyver.

For the moment he had the impulse to call to him by name, but the
conversation he had so recently had with Dan flashed into his mind, and
he decided to keep still and watch. The figure moved rapidly along the
west wall of the Inn almost the entire length of the building, until it
arrived at the entrance of the bowling-alley which abutted from the old
northern wing. Reaching this it paused for a moment, glancing about; then
inserted a key, fumbled for a moment with the latch, opened the door, and
disappeared within.

Tom was perplexed. He could not be sure that it was the Marquis; but
whether it were or not, he knew that there was no reason for any one
entering the old portion of the Inn at midnight. His first thought was to
go down alone and investigate; his second was to waken Dan.

He lowered the window gently, drew the curtains across it, and