We have now to return to Mr. Strange. That eminent detective was, to tell the truth, somewhat puzzled by his interview with Sir Karl Andinnian, held in the road; thrown, so to say, slightly on his beam ends. The earnest assurances of Sir Karl--that the individual he had been suspecting was the agent Smith, and that there was not, and could not be, any gentleman residing at the Maze--had made their due impression, for he saw that Sir Karl was a man whose word might be trusted. At the same time he detected, or thought he detected, an undue eagerness on Sir Karl\'s part to impress this upon him; an eagerness which the matter itself did not justify, unless Sir Karl had a private and personal motive for it. Musing on this, Mr. Strange had continued to walk about that evening instead of going on to his lodgings; and when Miss Blake surprised him underneath the trees at the Maze gate--or, rather, surprised herself by finding him there--he had not sought the spot to watch the gate, but as a shelter of seclusion while he thought. The stealthy entrance of Sir Karl Andinnian with a key taken from his pocket, and the whispered communication from Miss Blake, threw altogether another light upon the matter, and served to show what Sir Karl\'s personal motive might be. According to that lady\'s hints, Sir Karl was in the habit of stealing into the Maze, and that it was no one but Sir Karl himself who had been seen by Nurse Chaffen.

Mr. Detective Strange could not conceal from his acute brain that, if this were true, his own case was almost as good as disposed of, and he might prepare to go back to town. Salter, the prey he was patiently searching out, was at the Maze or nowhere--for Mr. Strange had turned the rest of the locality inside out, and knew that it contained no trace of him. If the gentleman in the evening dress, seen by Nurse Chaffen, was Sir Karl Andinnian, it could not have been Philip Salter: and, as his sole motive for suspecting the Maze was that worthy woman\'s account of him she had seen, why the grounds of suspicion seemed slipping from under him.

He thought it out well that night. Well and thoroughly. The tale was certainly likely and plausible. Sir Karl Andinnian did not appear to be one who would embark on this kind of private expedition; but, as the detective said to himself, one could not answer for one\'s own brother. Put it down as being Sir Karl that the woman saw, why then the mystery of her not having seen him again was at an end: for while she was there Sir Karl would not be likely to go to the Maze and show himself a second time.

The more Mr. Strange thought it out, the further reason he found for suspecting that this must be the true state of the case. It did not please him. Clear the Maze of all suspicion as to Salter, and it would become evident that they had been misled, and that so much valuable time had been wasted. He should have to go back to Scotland Yard and report the failure. Considering that he had latterly been furnishing reports of the prey being found and as good as in his hands, the prospect was mortifying. This would be the second consecutive case in which he had signally failed.

But it was by no means Mr. Strange\'s intention to take the failure for granted. He was too wary a detective to do that without seeking for proof, and he had not done with Foxwood yet. The first person he must see was Mrs. Chaffen.

Somewhat weary with his night reflections and not feeling quite so refreshed as he ought, for the thing had kept him awake till morning, Mr. Strange sat down to his breakfast languidly. Watchful Mrs. Jinks, who patronized her easy lodger and was allowed to visit his tea, and sugar, and butter, and cheese with impunity, observed this as she whipped off the cover from a dish of mushrooms that looked as though it might tempt an anchorite.

"You\'ve got a headache this morning, Mr. Strange, sir. Is it bad?"

"Oh, very bad," said Mr. Strange, who did not forget to keep up his r?le of delicate health as occasion afforded opportunity.

"What things them headaches are!" deplored Mrs. Jinks. "Nobody knows whence they come nor how to drive \'em away. Betsey Chaffen was nursing a patient in the spring, who\'d had bilious fever and rheumatis combined; and to hear what she said about that poor dear old gentleman\'s head----"

"By the way, how is Mrs. Chaffen?" interrupted Mr. Strange, with scant ceremony, and no regard to the old gentleman\'s head. "I have not seen her lately."

"She was here a day or two ago, sir; down in my kitchen. As to how she is, she\'s as strong as need be: which it\'s thanks to you for inquiring. She never has nothing the matter with her."

"Is she out nursing?"

"Not now. She expects to be called out soon, and is waiting at home for it."

"Where is her home?"

"Down Foxglove Lane, sir, turning off by Mr. Sumnor\'s church. Bull, the stonemason, lives in the end house there, and she have lodged with \'em for years. Bull tells her in joke sometimes that some of \'em ought to be took ill, with such a nurse as her in the house. Which they never are, for it\'s as healthy a spot as any in Foxwood."

Mr. Strange had a knack of politely putting an end to his landlady\'s gossip when he pleased, and of sending her away. He did so now: and the widow transferred herself and her attentions to Mr. Cattacomb\'s parlour.

People must hold spring and autumn cleanings, or where would their carpets and curtains bel Mrs. Chaffen, though occupying but one humble room (with a choice piece of furniture in it that was called a "bureau" by day, and was a bed by night) was not exempt from the general sanitary obligations. Mrs. Bull considered that she instituted these periodical bouts of scrubbing oftener than there was occasion for: but Betsey Chaffen liked to take care of her furniture--which was her own--and was moreover a cleanly woman.

On this self-same morning she was in the thick of it: her gown turned up about her waist, her hands and arms bare to the elbow, plunged into a bucket of soapsuds, herself on her knees, and the furniture all heaped together on the top of the shut-up bureau in the corner, when one of the young Bulls came in with the astounding news that a gentleman was asking for her.

"Goodness bless me!" cried the poor woman, turning cold all over, "it can\'t be that I\'m fetched out, can it, Sam?--and me just in the middle of all this mess!"

"He said, was Mrs. Chaffen at home, and could he see her," replied Sam. "He\'s a waiting outside:"

Mrs. Chaffen sat back on her heels, one hand resting on the bucket, the other grasping the wet scrubbing-brush, and her face the very picture of consternation as she stared at the boy. She had believed herself free for a full week to come.

"Is it Mr. Henley himself, Sam?"

"It ain\'t Mr. Henley at all," said Sam. "It\'s the gentleman what\'s staying at Mrs. Jinks\'s."

"What the plague brings him here this morning of all others, when I\'ve got the floor in a sop and not a chair to ask him to set down upon!" cried the woman, relieved of her great fear, but vexed nevertheless to be interrupted in her work, and believing the intruder to be Mr. Cattacomb, come on one of his pastoral visits: for that excellent divine made no scruple, in his zeal, of looking in occasionally on Mr. Sumnor\'s flock as well as his own. "Parsons be frightful bothers sometimes!"

"\'Tain\'t the parson; it\'s the t\'other one?" said Sam Bull.

Mrs. Chaffen rose from her knees, stepped gingerly across the wet floor, and took a peep through the window. There she saw Mr. Strange in the centre of a tribe of y............