“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.”
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
