CHAPTER XVII REVEALS ANOTHER PLOT
Approaching from Ealing Broadway, the huge electric-light standard, which was also a sign-post, shed a bright glow across the junction of the two roads. The thoroughfare on the right was Castlebar Road and on the left Carlton Road. In the latter road stood half a dozen big old trees, relics of a day when Ealing was a rural village and those trees formed a leafy way.
Beyond the sign-post, placed at the end of the triangle, lay a small open space of grass, and behind it a pleasant house with many trees in its spacious grounds.
At that hour silence reigned in that highly respectable suburban neighbourhood, and, as I went forward, I noticed that the figure beneath the trees was that of a man, who, emerging from the shadow, crossed the road leisurely and passed across the grass into the Castlebar Road, on the right hand.
He was dressed in dark clothes with a light grey felt hat, but so far was I away that to see his features was impossible, though the zone of light from the sign-post revealed his figure plainly.
Once he halted and looked in my direction, on hearing my footsteps, I suppose, but then continued his leisurely stroll.
I was upon the left-hand pavement, and in order not to attract the man's attention, passed along by the garden walls of the series of detached villas, for about two hundred yards, until the road ran in a curve round to the left, and thus I became hidden from his view.
When I found that I had not attracted the attention of the waiting man in the grey hat, I halted.
Was that the spot indicated? Was he one of those keeping the long-arranged appointment?
Ten o'clock had struck fully five minutes before, therefore, treading noiselessly, I retraced my steps until I could cautiously peep around the corner and see over the triangular plot of grass to the Castlebar Road.