"You would have me go shuddering past the fatal spot, I suppose, with shaking knees and averted head, eh? On the contrary, I have been down on the sands for more than an hour this morning, and have returned with an excellent appetite."
I looked at him curiously.
"I saw you returning," I said. "Your boots looked as though you had been wading in the wet sand. You were not there without a purpose."
"I was not," he admitted. "I seldom do anything without a purpose."
For a moment he abandoned the subject. He proceeded calmly with his breakfast, and addressed a few remarks to a man across the table, a man with short cropped hair and beard, and a shooting dress of sombre black.
"You are quite right," he said, turning towards me suddenly. "I had a purpose in going there. I thought that the gentleman whose untimely fate has enlisted your sympathies might have dropped something which would have been useful to me."
For the moment I forgot this man's kindness to me. I looked at him with a shudder.
"If you are in earnest," I said, "I trust that you were unsuccessful."
I fancied that there was that in his glance which suggested the St.
Bernard looking down on the terrier, and I chafed at it.
"It would have been better for you," he said, grimly, "had my search met with better result."