Moreover, though the magnifying action of the moon’s rays were probably accountable for it, there seemed to be something singularly bizarre about the figure, apart from its clothes; its head seemed abnormally round and small, its limbs abnormally long and emaciated, and its movements remarkably automatic and at the same time spiderlike.
Ronan gripped the envelope in his hand—it was solid enough; therefore, the queer, fantastic-looking thing, stalking so grotesquely towards him, must be solid too—a mere man—and Ronan forced a laugh. Another moment, and he had stepped out from under cover of the wall.
“Are you Mr Robert Dunloe?” he asked, “because, if so, I have a letter for you.”
The figure halted, and the white, parchment-like face with two very light green, cat-like eyes, bent down and favoured Ronan with a half-frightened, but penetrating gaze.
“Yes,” came the reply, “I am Mr Dunloe. But how came you with a letter for me? Give it to me at once.” And before Ronan could prevent him, he had snatched the envelope from his grasp, and, having broken open the seal, was reading the contents.
“Ah!” he ejaculated. “What a fool! I might have known so all along, but it’s not too late.” Then he folded the letter in his hand and stood holding it, apparently buried in thought.
Ronan, whose hot Irish temper had been roused by the rude manner in which the stranger had obtained possession of the missive, would have moved on and left him, had he not felt restrained by the same peculiar fascination he had experienced when talking to the girl.
“I trust,” he at length remarked, “that your letter contains no ill news. The lady who requested me to give it you mentioned the fact that a relative of hers had been taken very ill.”
“When and where did you see her?” the stranger queried, his eyes once again seeking Ronan’s face with the same fixed, penetrating stare.
“In that shelter over there,” Ronan answered, pointing to it. “We were strangers to one another, and I was sheltering from the storm. I explained to her that I was on my way to Lockerbie, and in no little hurry to get there, but she begged me so earnestly to await your arrival, so that I might hand you the letter, that she might be free to return home at once, that I consented. That is all that passed between us.”