“No sign of blood. He was rather difficult to hit—I was afraid of hurting you, too.”
A window had been thrown up and Jack Knebworth’s voice bawled into the night.
“What’s the shooting? Is that you, Brixan?”
“It is I. Come down, and I’ll tell you all about it.”
The noise did not seem to have aroused Mr. Longvale, or, for the matter of that, any other member of the party; and when Knebworth reached the garden, he found no other audience than Mike Brixan.
In a few words Michael told him what he had seen.
“The monkey belongs to friend Penne,” he said. “I saw it this morning.”
“What do you think—that he was prowling round and saw the open window?”
Michael shook his head.
“No,” he said quietly, “he came with one intention and purpose, which was to carry off your leading lady. That sounds highly dramatic and improbable, and that is the opinion I have formed. This ape, I tell you, is nearly human.”