"A week later, Stella and the servant having returned, they all awoke one morning some hours later than usual. The bedrooms were heavy with the fumes of a drug; locks had been broken, chests, desks and cupboards had been opened, and their contents strewed the floors. But, strange to say, nothing had been stolen.
"Two nights after this Dr. Morse was struck down in a lane; he was found by some workmen and brought home. Of this incident he refused to speak other than that he had not been robbed.
"Stella now became frightened. At night she saw shadows flitting in the garden; that these were not fancies was proven by the strange foot-prints which I found in the soft mould. The dog died of poison; another was procured, a savage, crafty creature; but she went the way of the first. One day, and at broad noon, the doctor arose from his desk and went into an adjoining room for a book. He was not gone above a minute; but upon returning he found a loaded revolver lying upon the tablet upon which he had been writing. This apparently drove him frantic, for he seized the weapon and rushed through the house. But there was no one save Stella and old Nanon.
"Then once again they were drugged and the house ransacked, but this time the attention of the intruders seemed directed toward Dr. Morse's papers only. They showed every indication of having been exhaustively examined; but nothing was missing.
"As these things continued, the tension began to tell; the face of Stella's uncle became drawn and his eyes quick and feverish. At the least sound he would start; and it became almost as much as one's life was worth to approach him from behind. Then suddenly and secretly he made up his mind to come to America; at the last moment he made me an offer to accompany them as his secretary.
"'The work upon my proposed book will be heavy,' he said, 'and I shall require aid.'" Here young Warwick nodded and smiled. "Nothing could have fallen in better with my desires than this," he said. "And so, of course, I accepted the proposal. This was three years ago; at first we occupied apartments in the city here; but some five months back, Dr. Morse took a house on Fordham Road, Eastbury; and there the work upon the book, the idea of which had greatly expanded, went on without a halt.