"Who is it?"
"Mr. Oliver Nisbet."
"Ah!"
And now a strange incident occurred, visible to me, but not to Bob. In the clear moonlight I saw the skeleton cat creeping toward the man who was watching. Slowly it advanced and fastened itself upon him, and climbed upward till it reached his shoulder. And there it squatted, its yellow eyes resting ominously on Mr. Nisbet's face. He seemed to be perfectly unconscious of the presence of the apparition, but to me it was an unmistakable sign, more powerful than the strongest human proof, that the man had been guilty of a horrible crime. In silence we stood at the window for several minutes, and then Mr. Nisbet slunk away to the rear of the garden. He climbed the crumbling wall which encompassed it, and was gone.
"What do you say to that, Ned?" asked Bob.
I could not answer, so enthralled was I by the spiritual evidence of guilt of which I had been a witness. Bob looked at me inquiringly.
"Your face is as white as death," he said. "Are you ill?"
"A moment, Bob," I replied; and when I was sufficiently recovered I explained to him what I had seen. It stirred him as deeply as it had stirred me.
"If a shadow of doubt was in my mind," he said, "it is dispelled. The villain must be brought to justice."
"He shall be, if human effort can accomplish it. I will not rest till his guilt is brought home to him."