"But," and the young man gestured oddly, after the fashion of one curiously impressed, "though the doctor had crossed the sea he had not traveled beyond the reach of his mysterious persecutor. The happenings at Eastbury are every bit as queer as those at Sharsdale; and they began in the same way. As the doctor and I sat working in the library one day, a taxi-cab stopped and Karkowsky, as cheerful, red cheeked and comfortable as before, alighted. And as before, he seemed in great haste. Apparently Dr. Morse had never marked, as I had done, Karkowsky's first visit as the beginning of his strange troubles. At any rate he showed no resentment, but merely seemed surprised at so unexpected a visitor. The Pole talked volubly about the new country and of his prospects; the delicate matters, so he said, which it was his business to handle were vastly greater in number in America. And I noted that he kept to this point; no matter what unexpected turn was given the conversation he always came back to it. And all the time he kept his eyes fixed eagerly upon the doctor. But at the end of a half hour he arose; again I sensed that he was disappointed; but he said nothing, merely handing my employer another card and begging that he be summoned any time his services were needed. Then he took his departure.
"It was next morning that I entered the library rather quietly and found Dr. Morse with a heap of mail before him; in his hand he held a square of white paper at which he looked fixedly. Upon this was a roughly drawn device done in brown crayon. I could make nothing of it. When he discovered me looking over his shoulder he uttered an impatient exclamation, tore the sheet into strips and tossed them into the waste basket. That same day I opened some mail matter, as was my habit when the doctor was not about; and in one of the envelopes I came upon a duplicate of the drawing that I had seen in my employer's hands. When I handed this to him a little later I fancied that I caught a gleam of the old haunted look which I had so often noted at Sharsdale."
"Have you, by any chance, one of these drawings?" asked Ashton-Kirk.
"I have." Philip Warwick took out a wallet and from it selected a paper. "It is the third that came—and in every respect like the other two."
The secret agent looked at the paper carefully; it bore a rough, hurried tracing done with a brown material—and looked much like this:
Attentively Ashton-Kirk examined the drawing. But if it bore any meaning for him, he gave no indication of it; for placing the paper upon the table, he said:
"Go on."
"As I had suspected upon sight of Karkowsky," resumed Warwick, "the persecution of Dr. Morse was resumed. But, so it seemed, the matter had entered into a new phase. There was no more mysterious prowling, waylaying and housebreaking; the mail only was used. But, so far as I know, duplicates of this drawing," pointing to the one which the secret agent had just laid down, "were the only things sent up to yesterday. The outline of the thing never varied; but, oddly enough, the color has."
"Ah!"