“The strong vitality of the living is what this sort of creature is supposed to need most,” he went on imperturbably, “and where he has worked and thought and struggled before is the easiest place for him to get it in.  The former conditions are in some way more easily reconstructed—­” He stopped suddenly, and devoted all his attention to the gun.  “It’s difficult to explain, you know, rather,” he added presently, “and, besides, it’s much better that you should not know till afterwards.”

I made a noise that was the beginning of a score of questions and of as many sentences, but it got no further than a mere noise, and Shorthouse, of course, stepped in again.

“Your scepticism,” he added, “is one of the qualities that induce me to ask you to spend the night there with me.”

“In those days,” he went on, in response to my urging for more information, “the family were much abroad, and often travelled for years at a time.  This man was invaluable in their absence.  His wonderful knowledge of horticulture kept the gardens—­French, Italian, English—­in perfect order.  He had carte blanche in the matter of expense, and of course selected all his own underlings.  It was the sudden, unexpected return of the master that surprised the amazing stories of the countryside before the fellow, with all his cleverness, had time to prepare or conceal.”

“But is there no evidence, no more recent evidence, to show that something is likely to happen if we sit up there?” I asked, pressing him yet further, and I think to his liking, for it showed at least that I was interested.  “Has anything happened there lately, for instance?”

Shorthouse glanced up from the gun he was cleaning so assiduously, and the smoke from his pipe curled up into an odd twist between me and the black beard and oriental, sun-tanned face.  The magnetism of his look and expression brought more sense of conviction to me than I had felt hitherto, and I realised that there had been a sudden little change in my attitude and that I was now much more inclined to go in for the adventure with him.  At least, I thought, with such a man, one would be safe in any emergency; for he is determined, resourceful, and to be depended upon.

“There’s the point,” he answered slowly; “for there has apparently been a fresh outburst—­an attack almost, it seems,—­quite recently.  There is evidence, of course, plenty of it, or I should not feel the interest I do feel, but—­” he hesitated a moment, as though considering how much he ought to let me know, “but the fact is that three men this summer, on separate occasions, who have gone into that barn after nightfall, have been accosted—­”

“Accosted?” I repeated, betrayed into the interruption by his choice of so singular a word.