“May I speak to you, Mr. Brixan?” he said in a low voice, and they went into the house together. “Do you remember Mr. Knebworth was very perturbed because he thought he saw somebody peering in at the window—something with a monkey’s head?”
Michael nodded.
“Well, it is a most curious fact,” said the old gentleman impressively, “that a quarter of an hour ago I happened to be walking in the far end of my garden, and, looking across the hedge toward the field, I suddenly saw a gigantic form rise, apparently from the ground, and move toward these bushes”—he pointed through the window to a clump in a field on the opposite side of the road. “He seemed to be crouching forward and moving furtively.”
“Will you show me the place?” said Michael quickly.
He followed the other across the road to the bushes, a little clump which was empty when they reached it. Kneeling down to make a new skyline, Michael scanned the limited horizon, but there was no sign of Bhag. For that it was Bhag he had no doubt. There might be nothing in it. Penne told him that the animal was in the habit of taking nightly strolls, and that he was perfectly harmless. Suppose . . .
The thought was absurd, fantastically absurd. And yet the animal had been so extraordinarily human that no speculation in connection with it was quite absurd.
When he returned to the garden, he went in search of the girl. She had finished her scene and was watching the stealthy movements of two screen burglars, who were creeping along the wall in the subdued light of the arcs.
“Excuse me, Miss Leamington, I’m going to ask you an impertinent question. Have you brought a complete change of clothes with you?”
“Why ever do you ask that?” she demanded, her eyes wide open. “Of course I did! I always bring a complete change in case the weather breaks.”
“That’s one question. Did you lose anything when you were at Griff Towers?”