"Well, Mr. Knox, it's 'ard to say what it was like. It wasn't a cat, nor yet it wasn't what you could call a squirrel——"
Flurry got on to his feet.
"By the living Jingo!" he said, turning to me an awestruck countenance; "he's seen the Aussolas Martin Cat!"
I had never before heard of the Aussolas Martin Cat, and it is indisputable that a slight chill crept down my backbone.
Mr. Tebbutts' eyes bulged more than ever, and his lower lip fell.
"What way did it go?" said Flurry; "did it look at you?"
"It seemed to disappear in that recess by the door," faltered the seer of the vision; "it just vanished!"
"I don't know if it's for my grandmother or for me," said Flurry in a low voice, "but it's a death in the house anyway."
The colour in Mr. Tebbutts' face deepened to a glossy sealing-wax red.
"If one of you gents would come upstairs with me," he said, "I think I'll just get my traps together. I can be back at the 'otel in 'alf an 'our——"