“Confound it,” said the detective, as he got out and paid his fare, which was by no means a light one, but over which he had no time to argue, “we’ve come in a circle, and I do believe he lives in Powlett Street after all.”

He went into the gardens, and saw Brian some distance ahead of him, walking rapidly.  It was bright moonlight, and he could easily distinguish Fitzgerald by his light coat.

As he went along that noble avenue with its elms in their winter dress, the moon shining through their branches wrought a fantastic tracery, on the smooth asphalte.  And on either side Gorby could see the dim white forms of the old Greek gods and goddesses—­Venus Victrix, with the apple in her hand (which Mr. Gorby, in his happy ignorance of heathen mythology, took for Eve offering Adam the forbidden fruit); Diana, with the hound at her feet, and Bacchus and Ariadne (which the detective imagined were the Babes in the Wood).  He knew that each of the statues had queer names, but thought they were merely allegorical.  Passing over the bridge, with the water rippling quietly underneath, Brian went up the smooth yellow path to where the statue of Hebe, holding the cup, seems instinct with life; and turning down the path to the right, he left the gardens by the end gate, near which stands the statue of the Dancing Faun, with the great bush of scarlet geranium burning like an altar before it.  Then he went along the Wellington Parade, and turned up Powlett Street, where he stopped at a house near Cairns’ Memorial Church, much to Mr. Gorby’s relief, who, being like Hamlet, “fat and scant of breath,” found himself rather exhausted.  He kept well in the shadow, however, and saw Fitzgerald give one final look round before he disappeared into the house.  Then Mr. Gorby, like the Robber Captain in Ali Baba, took careful stock of the house, and fixed its locality and appearance well in his mind, as he intended to call at it on the morrow.

“What I’m going to do,” he said, as he walked slowly back to Melbourne, “is to see his landlady when he’s out, and find out what time he came in on the night of the murder.  If it fits into the time he got out of Rankin’s cab, I’ll get out a warrant, and arrest him straight off.”

CHAPTER IX.

MR. GORBY IS SATISFIED AT LAST.

In spite of his long walk, and still longer drive, Brian did not sleep well that night.  He kept tossing and turning, or lying on his back, wide awake, looking into the darkness and thinking of Whyte.  Towards dawn, when the first faint glimmer of morning came through the venetian blinds, he fell into a sort of uneasy doze, haunted by horrible dreams.  He thought he was driving in a hansom, when suddenly he found Whyte by his side, clad in white cerements, grinning and gibbering at him with ghastly merriment.  Then the cab went over a precipice, and he fell from a great height, down, down, with the mocking laughter