The midday was warm, but I cooled my eyes on the deep shadows of the wood, through which at intervals I saw white sails flash on the lake. All bird-song was hushed, but a woodpecker on a dead sycamore hammered away for dear life. The bobbing of his red head must have exercised some hypnotic spell, for I slept a few minutes, and dreamed that the woodpecker had bored a hole in my forehead. When I roused it was with a start that sent my pipe clattering to the stone terrace floor. A man who has ever camped or hunted or been hunted—and I have known all three experiences—always scrutinizes the horizons when he wakes, and I found myself staring into the wood. As my eyes sought remembered landmarks here and there, I saw a man dressed as a common sailor skulking toward the boat-house several hundred yards away. He was evidently following the school wall to escape observation, and I rose and stepped closer to the balustrade to watch his movements. In a moment he came out into a little open space wherein stood a stone tower where water was stored for the house, and he paused here and gazed about him curiously. I picked up a field-glass from a little table near by and caught sight of a swarthy foreign face under a soft felt hat. He passed the tower and walked on toward the lake, and I dropped over the balustrade and followed him.
The Japanese boy was still at work on the launch, and, hearing a step on the pier planking, he glanced up, then rose and asked the stranger his business.
The man shook his head.
"If you have business it must be at the house; the road is in the other direction," and Ijima pointed to the wood, but the stranger remained stubbornly on the edge of the pier. I now stepped out of the wood and walked down to the pier.
"What do you want here?" I demanded sharply.
The man touched his hat, smiled, and shook his head. The broad hand he lifted in salute was that of a laborer, and its brown back was tattooed. He belonged, I judged, to one of the dark Mediterranean races, and I tried him in Italian.
"These are private grounds; you will do well to leave here very quickly," I said.
I saw his eyes light as I spoke the words slowly and distinctly, but he waited until I had finished, then shook his head.
I was sure he had understood, but as I addressed him again, ordering him from the premises, he continued to shake his head and grin foolishly. Then I pointed toward the road.
"Go; and it will be best for you not to come here again!" I said, and, after saluting, he walked slowly away into the wood, with a sort of dogged insolence in his slightly swaying gait. At a nod from me Ijima stole after him while I waited, and in a few minutes the boy came back and reported that the man had passed the house and left the grounds by the carriage entrance, turning toward Annandale.