A WOMAN'S TONGUE Grooton returned a few minutes later from the village.

He begged the favour of a few words with me.

He was a man of impassive features and singular quietness of demeanour.

Yet it was obvious that something had happened to disturb him.
"I think it only right, sir, that you should know of the reports which are circulating in the neighbourhood," he said, fixing his dark grave eyes respectfully upon me.

"I called for a few minutes at the inn, and made it my business to listen." "Do these reports concern me, Grooton ?" I asked.
"They do, sir." "Go ahead, then," I told him.
"They refer also, sir," he said, "to the man who was found dead near the cottage where you used to live in January last.