the Avenue, he sneaked[Page 60] along on the other side, much after the manner of a disobedient dog who had been told to stay at home. Dick hailed a passing stage, after walking a little way, and almost as soon as he was seated the man also got in. Richard was not in a mood to bear watching, so he jumped out when he saw an empty hansom cab, and, engaging it, told the driver to cross town. He did not drive far until he had made sure that he had eluded his would-be follower, and having no appetite yet for dinner he ordered the driver to go to Central Park, where he paid and dismissed him. [Page 60] Now that he was alone, he became conscious of a desire to visit the scene of the mystery which promised to be so fatal to his happiness. “I’ll go there and think it over,” he mused; “it may give me some idea how to work it out.” And on he walked over the course he and Penelope had taken that direful morning. [Page 61] [Page 61] Night was coming on and the Park was deserted, except for an occasional workman taking a hurried cut across the Park home. How dreary and quiet everything was, and then he thought about the officer who had made himself so obnoxious. This led him to wonder if there were no policemen on duty at night in the Park. He could not remember of ever having noticed any the few times he had visited the Park after nightfall, and there were none visible now anywhere. He stopped to look for a few moments at the bench where they had found the dead girl, and then he walked on until he came to a bench near the reservoir, where he sat down, and lighting a cigarette gave himself up to unhappy thoughts on his unhappy position. “If only the Fates would throw something in my way to help me solve that mystery,” he thought. “Unless the most extraordinary things occur I shall never be able to tell anything[Page 62] about it. Penelope firmly believes it was a murder, but I can’t see what grounds she has for it. She thinks it was a deliberate and well-planned murder, because no one has claimed the girl, and I sometimes think so myself, but how to prove it?—that’s the question.” [Page 62] And Dick gazed seriously at the space of light made by the opening for the reservoir, and on to the dense thickness of trees where night seemed to be lurking, ready to pounce down on all late comers.
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