other things, engaged on a work of criminology based on impressions derived from face-to-face communication with notorious criminals.
"The morning I received Krantz's summons was the morning I had set aside for a special study of S—— M——, whose case has recently commanded so much public attention; but the moment I read the wire, I changed my plans, without either hesitation or compunction. Krantz was Krantz, and his dictum could not be disobeyed.
"Tearing down la rue Saint Denis, and narrowly avoiding collision with a lady who lives in la rue Saint François, and will persist in wearing hats and heels that outrage alike every sense of decency and good form, I hustled into the station, and, rushing down the steps, just succeeded in catching the Carnac train. After a journey which, for slowness, most assuredly holds the record, I arrived, boiling over with indignation, at Armennes, where Krantz met me. After luncheon he led the way to his study, and, as soon as the servant who handed us coffee had left the room, began his explanation of the telegram.
"'As you know, Trobas,' he observed, 'it's not all bliss to be a landlord. Up to the present I have been singularly fortunate, inasmuch as I have never experienced any difficulty in getting tenants for my houses. Now, however, there has been a sudden and most alarming change, and I have just received no less than a dozen notices from tenants desirous of giving up their habitations at once. Here they are!' And he handed me a bundle of letters, for the most
part written in the scrawling hand of the illiterate. 'If you look,' he went on, 'you will see that none of them give any reason for leaving. It is merely—"We CANNOT POSSIBLY stay here any longer," or "We MUST give up possession IMMEDIATELY," which they have done, and in every instance before the quarter was up. Being naturally greatly astonished and perturbed, I made careful inquiries, and, at length—for the North Country rustic is most reticent and difficult to "draw"—succeeded in extracting from three of them the reason for the general exodus. The houses are all HAUNTED! There was nothing amiss with them, they informed me, till about three weeks ago, when they all heard all sorts of alarming noises—crashes as if every atom of crockery they possessed was being broken; bangs on the panels of doors; hideous groans; diabolical laughs; and blood-curdling screams. Nor was that all; some of them vowed they had seen things—horrible hairy hands, with claw-like nails and knotted joints, that came out of dark corners and grabbed at them; naked feet with enormous filthy toes; and faces—HORRIBLE faces that peeped at them over the banisters or through the windows; and sooner than stand any more of it—sooner than have their wives and bairns frightened out of their senses, they would sacrifice a quarter's rent and go. "We are sorry, Mr Krantz," they said in conclusion, "for you have been a most considerate landlord, but stay we cannot."' Here my friend paused.
"'And have you no explanation of these hauntings?' I asked.
"Krantz shook his head. 'No!' he said, 'the whole thing is a most profound mystery to me. At first I attributed it to practical jokers, people dressed up; but a couple of nights' vigil in the haunted district soon dissipated that theory.'
"'You say district,' I remarked. 'Are the houses close together—in the same road or valley?'
"'In a valley,' Krantz responded—'the Valley of Dolmen. It is ten miles from here.'
"'Dolmen!' I murmured, 'why Dolmen?'