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"Are you suggesting that he can't vanish at night?" returned Trounce.

"No. Remember, the first time I saw him he did vanish at night!"

"Then what?"

"I don't know!"

"This business presents one confounded puzzle after another!" exclaimed Trounce.

They came to the outskirts of Chislehurst, rode through the town, now abustle with the morning market, out the other side, and down a country lane toward the village.

The mist had dispersed entirely and the sky was a jumbled mass of clouds with patches of blue sky occasionally peeking through.

From the brow of a low hill, Burton recognised Mickleham ahead, and a few minutes later he and Detective Inspector Trounce parked their velocipedes at the side of the same field the king's agent had landed in earlier that morning.

The two constables were still on duty by the gate of the ramshackle cottage. It was to this that Trounce led Burton.

The Yard man knocked on the front door and it was opened by a man in corduroy trousers, shirt, and suspenders, with tousled hair, long sideburns, and wire-framed spectacles.

"Police?" he asked, in a lowered voice.

"Yes, sir. I'm Detective Inspector Trounce of Scotland Yard. This is my associate, Captain Burton. You are Mr. Tew?"

"Yes. Edward. Come in."

They stepped across the threshold and found that the door opened directly into a fairly cramped and low-roofed sitting room. On a threadbare sofa, a pretty young girl lay within her mother's protective embrace. The woman was large, matronly, tearful, and shaking uncontrollably. The girl was wide-eyed and, thought Burton, rather too thin.

"Angela, these are policemen from London," said Edward Tew, gently.

"She can't speak. She's too upset," interrupted the mother. "I know what she feels! I know!"

"Quiet now, Tilly," said Tew. "The girl is calm enough now. Go make a pot of tea; give the gentlemen room to sit down."

"No! Leave her alone. I-she-she can't talk!"

"Yes I can, Mother," whispered the girl.

The woman turned and kissed her daughter's cheek; held her hands.

"Are you sure? You don't have to. It'll just be questions, questions, questions!"

"Tilly, please!" snapped Edward Tew.

"It's all right, Mother," whispered the girl.

With a sniff and lowered eyes, the mother nodded, stood, and left the room.

"Sit with your daughter, Mr. Tew," said Trounce, gesturing to the sofa as he lowered himself onto a wooden chair next to a small table on which a vase of flowers stood. Tew did so, while Burton sat in the single armchair.

"Now then, it's Angela, isn't it?" the detective asked, in a kindly voice.

"Yes, sir," answered the girl, quietly.

"Would you tell me what happened? Try not to miss anything out. Every detail is important."

Angela Tew nodded, and her throat worked convulsively for a moment.

"I work as maid for the Longthorns, sir, them what lives in the grand old house on Saint Paul's Wood Hill. I was agoing there this morning and left here at-at-"

"At about ten to five," put in her father. "She works from five in the morning until two in the afternoon. Go on, Angey."

"So I took me the short cut through Hoblingwell Wood."

"Isn't it rather dark at that time of morning?" asked Trounce. "Dark, I mean, to be wandering through the woods?"

"It's very dark, sir, aye, but the path is straight and I takes an oil lamp with me to light the way. I goes that way all the time, I does."

"And what happened?"

"I was a good way along the path when a man stepped out from the trees. I couldn't see him properly, so I lifted the lamp and I says, `Who's that there?' Then I saw he was very tall and had big long legs like one of them circus folks what walks on sticks. I tells you, sir, round here we all know the stories about the ghost what's called Spring Heeled Jack and I ain't stupid. I saw what he was and recognised him straight off from the tales. So I turned and started arunning as fast as I could but I hardly got two steps afore he grabbed me up from behind and clapped his hand over me mouth. Then he-he-"

She