envelope in one hand and five dried orange pips in the
outstretched palm of the other one. He had always laughed at what
he called my cock-and-bull story about the colonel, but he looked
very scared and puzzled now that the same thing had come upon
himself.

"'Why, what on earth does this mean, John?' he stammered.

"My heart had turned to lead. 'It is K. K. K.,' said I.

"He looked inside the envelope. 'So it is,' he cried. 'Here are
the very letters. But what is this written above them?'

"'Put the papers on the sundial,' I read, peeping over his
shoulder.

"'What papers? What sundial?' he asked.

"'The sundial in the garden. There is no other,' said I; 'but the
papers must be those that are destroyed.'

"'Pooh!' said he, gripping hard at his courage. 'We are in a
civilised land here, and we can't have tomfoolery of this kind.
Where does the thing come from?'

"'From Dundee,' I answered, glancing at the postmark.

"'Some preposterous practical joke,' said he. 'What have I to do
with sundials and papers? I shall take no notice of such
nonsense.'

"'I should certainly speak to the police,' I said.

"'And be laughed at for my pains. Nothing of the sort.'

"'Then let me do so?'

"'No, I forbid you. I won't have a fuss made about such
nonsense.'

"It was in vain to argue with him, for he was a very obstinate
man. I went about, however, with a heart which was full of
forebodings.

"On the third day after the coming of the letter my father went
from home to visit an old friend of his, Major Freebody, who is
in command of one of the forts upon Portsdown Hill. I was glad
that he should go, for it seemed to me that he was farther from
danger when he was away from home. In that, however, I was in
error. Upon the second day of his absence I received a telegram
from the major, imploring me to come at once. My father had
fallen over one of the deep chalk-pits which abound in the
neighbourhood, and was lying senseless, with a shattered skull. I
hurried to him, but he passed away without having ever recovered
his consciousness. He had, as it appears, been returning from
Fareham in the twilight, and as the country was unknown to him,
and the chalk-pit unfenced, the jury had no hesitation in
bringing in a verdict of 'death from accidental causes.'
Carefully as I examined every fact connected with his death, I
was unable to find anything which could suggest the idea of
murder. There were no signs of violence, no footmarks, no
robbery, no record of strangers having been seen upon the roads.
And yet I need not tell you that my mind was far from at ease,
and that I was well-nigh certain that some foul plot had been
woven round him.

"In this sinister way I came into my inheritance. You will ask me
why I did not dispose of it? I answer, because I was well
convinced that our troubles were in some way dependent upon an
incident in my uncle's life, and that the danger would be as
pressing in one house as in another.

"It was in January, '85, that my poor father met his end, and two
years and eight months have elapsed since then. During that time
I have lived happily at Horsham, and I had begun to hope that
this curse had passed away from the family, and that it had ended
with the last generation. I had begun to take comfort too soon,
however; yesterday morning the blow fell in the very shape in
which it had come upon my father."

The young man took from his waistcoat a crumpled envelope, and
turning to the table he shook out upon it five little dried
orange pips.

"This is the envelope," he continued. "The postmark is
London--eastern division. Within are the very words which were
upon my father's last message: 'K. K. K.'; and then 'Put the
papers on the sundial.'"

"What have you done?" asked Holmes.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"To tell the truth"--he sank his face into his thin, white
hands--"I have felt helpless. I have felt like one of those poor
rabbits when the snake is writhing towards it. I seem to be in
the grasp of some resistless, inexorable evil, which no foresight
and no precautions can guard against."


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