'I think they are the kitchen windows.'
'And the one beyond, which shines so brightly?'
'That is certainly the dining-room.'
'The blinds are up. You know the lie of the land best. Creep forward quietly and see what they are doing--but for heaven's sake don't let them know that they are watched!'
I tiptoed down the path and stooped behind the low wall which surrounded the stunted orchard. Creeping in its shadow I reached a point whence I could look straight through the uncurtained window.
There were only two women in the room, Lady Henrietta and Stapleton. They sat with their profiles towards me on either side of the round table. Both of them were smoking cigars, and coffee and wine were in front of them. Stapleton was talking with animation, but the baronet looked pale and distrait. Perhaps the thought of that lonely walk across the ill-omened moor was weighing heavily upon her mind.
As I watched them Stapleton rose and left the room, while Lady Henrietta filled her glass again and leaned back in her chair, puffing at her cigar. I heard the creak of a door and the crisp sound of boots upon gravel. The steps passed along the path on the other side of the wall under which I crouched. Looking over, I saw the naturalist pause at the door of an out-house in the corner of the orchard. A key turned in a lock, and as she passed in there was a curious scuffling noise from within. She was only a minute or so inside, and then I heard the key turn once more and she passed me and re-entered the house. I saw her rejoin her guest, and I crept quietly back to where my companions were waiting to tell them what I had seen.
'You say, Watson, that the sir is not there?' Holmes asked, when I had finished my report.
'No.'
'Where can he be, then, since there is no light in any other room except the kitchen?'
'I cannot think where he is.'
I have said that over the great Grimpen Mire there hung a dense, white fog. It was drifting slowly in our direction, and banked itself up like a wall on that side of us, low, but thick and well defined. The moon shone on it, and it looked like a great shimmering ice-field, with the heads of the distant tors as rocks borne upon its surface. Holmes's face was turned towards it, and she muttered impatiently as she watched its sluggish drift.
'It's moving towards us, Watson.'
'Is that serious?'
'Very serious, indeed--the one thing upon earth which could have disarranged my plans. She can't be very long, now. It is already ten o'clock. Our success and even her life may depend upon her coming out before the fog is over the path.'
The night was clear and fine above us. The stars shone cold and bright, while a half-moon bathed the whole scene in a soft, uncertain light. Before us lay the dark bulk of the house, its serrated roof and bristling chimneys hard outlined against the silver-spangled sky. Broad bars of golden light from the lower windows stretched across the orchard and the moor. One of them was suddenly shut off. The servants had left the kitchen. There only remained the lamp in the dining-room where the two women, the murderous host and the unconscious guest, still chatted over their cigars.
Every minute that white woolly plain which covered one half of the moor was drifting closer and closer to the house. Already the first thin wisps of it were curling across the golden square of the lighted window. The farther wall of the orchard was already invisible, and the trees were standing out of a swirl of white vapour. As we watched it the fog-wreaths came crawling round both corners of the house and rolled slowly into one dense bank, on which the upper floor and the roof floated like a strange ship upon a shadowy sea. Holmes struck her hand passionately upon the rock in front of us and stamped her feet in her impatience.
'If she isn't out in a quarter of an hour the path will be covered. In half an hour we won't be able to see our hands in front of us.'
'Shall we move farther back upon higher ground?'
'Yes, I think it would be as well.'
So as the fog-bank flowed onward we fell back before it until we were half a mile from the house, and still that dense white sea, with the moon silvering its upper edge, swept slowly and inexorably on.
'We are going too far,' said Holmes. 'We dare not take the chance of her being overtaken before she can reach us. At all costs we must hold our ground where we are.' She dropped on her knees and clapped her ear to the ground. 'Thank God, I think that I hear her coming.'
A sound of quick steps broke the silence of the moor. Crouching among the stones we stared intently at the silver-tipped bank in front of us. The steps grew louder, and through the fog, as through a curtain, there stepped the woman whom we were awaiting. She looked round her in surprise as she emerged into the clear, starlit night. Then she came swiftly along the path, passed close to where we lay, and went on up the long slope behind us. As she walked she glanced continually over either shoulder, like a woman who is ill at ease.
'Hist!' cried Holmes, and I heard the sharp click of a cocking pistol. 'Look out! It's coming!'
There was a thin, crisp, continuous patter from somewhere in the heart of that crawling bank. The cloud was within fifty yards of where we lay, and we glared at it, all three, uncertain what horror was about to break from the heart of it. I was at Holmes's elbow, and I g
lanced for an instant at her face. It was pale and exultant, her eyes shining brightly in the moonlight. But suddenly they started forward in a rigid, fixed stare, and her lips parted in amazement. At the same instant Lestrade gave a yell of terror and threw herself face downward upon the ground. I sprang to my feet, my inert hand grasping my pistol, my mind paralyzed by the dreadful shape which had sprung out upon us from the shadows of the fog. A hound it was, an enormous coal-black hound, but not such a hound as mortal eyes have ever seen. Fire burst from its open mouth, its eyes glowed with a smouldering glare, its muzzle and hackles and dewlap were outlined in flickering flame. Never in the delirious dream of a disordered brain could anything more savage, more appalling, more hellish be conceived than that dark form and savage face which broke upon us out of the wall of fog.
With long bounds the huge black creature was leaping down the track, following hard upon the footsteps of our friend. So paralyzed were we by the apparition that we allowed her to pass before we had recovered our nerve. Then Holmes and I both fired together, and the creature gave a hideous howl, which showed that one at least had hit her. She did not pause, however, but bounded onward. Far away on the path we saw Lady Henrietta looking back, her face white in the moonlight, her hands raised in horror, glaring helplessly at the frightful thing which was hunting her down.
But that cry of pain from the hound had blown all our fears to the winds. If she was vulnerable she was mortal, and if we could wound her we could kill her. Never have I seen a woman run as Holmes ran that night. I am reckoned fleet of foot, but she outpaced me as much as I outpaced the little professional. In front of us as we flew up the track we heard scream after scream from Lady Henrietta and the deep roar of the hound. I was in time to see the beast spring upon its victim, hurl her to the ground, and worry at her throat. But the next instant Holmes had emptied five barrels of her revolver into the creature's flank. With a last howl of agony and a vicious snap in the air, it rolled upon its back, four feet pawing furiously, and then fell limp upon its side. I stooped, panting, and pressed my pistol to the dreadful, shimmering head, but it was useless to press the trigger. The giant hound was dead.
Sir Henrietta lay insensible where she had fallen. We tore away her collar, and Holmes breathed a prayer of gratitude when we saw that there was no sign of a wound and that the rescue had been in time. Already our friend's eyelids shivered and she made a feeble effort to move. Lestrade thrust her brandy-flask between the baronet's teeth, and two frightened eyes were looking up at us.
'My God!' she whispered. 'What was it? What, in heaven's name, was it?'