"What?" she asked timidly. "You're uneasy about something."
"It's a marvel to me—if it is Hollis—however he comes to be there," answered Neale at last. "According to all we know, he certainly went to meet somebody on Saturday night. I can't think how anybody who knew the district would have let a stranger do such a risky thing as to lean over one of those shafts. Besides, if anybody was with him, and there was an accident, why hasn't the accident been reported? Betty!—it's more like murder!"
"You think he may have been thrown down there?" she asked fearfully.
"Thrown down or forced down—it's all the same," said Neale. "There may have been a struggle—a fight. But there, what's the use of speculating? We don't even know whose body it is yet. Let's get on and tell those police chaps."
Turning off the open moor on to the highway at the corner of Scarnham Bridge, they suddenly came face to face with Gabriel Chestermarke, who, for once in a way, was walking instead of driving into the town. The two young people, emerging from the shelter of a high hedgerow which bordered the moorland at that point, started at sight of the banker's colourless face, cold and set as usual. But Gabriel betrayed no surprise, and was in no way taken aback. He lifted his hat in silence, and was marching on when Neale impulsively hailed him.
"Mr. Chestermarke!" he exclaimed.
Gabriel halted and turned, looking at his late clerk with absolute impassiveness. He made no remark, and stood like a statue, waiting for Neale to speak.
"You may like to know," said Neale, coming up to him, "we have just found the body of a man on the moor—Ellersdeane Hollow."
Gabriel showed no surprise. No light came into his eyes, no colour to his cheek. It seemed a long time before his firmly set lips relaxed.
"A man?" he said quietly. "What man?"