47232    Look at the great trench in the opposite hill.

47233    That is his mark.

47234    Yes, you will find some very singular points about the moor, Dr Watson.

47235    Oh, excuse me an instant!

47236    It is surely Cyclopides.'

47237    A small fly or moth had fluttered across our path, and in an instant Stapleton was rushing with extraordinary energy and speed in pursuit of it.

47238    To my dismay the creature flew straight for the great Mire, but my acquaintance never paused for an instant, bounding from tuft to tuft behind it, his green net waving in the air.

47239    His grey clothes and jerky, zigzag, irregular progress made him not unlike some huge moth himself.

47240    I was standing watching his pursuit with a mixture of admiration for his extraordinary activity and fear lest he should lose his footing in the treacherous Mire, when I heard the sound of steps, and, turning round, found a woman near me upon the path.

47241    She had come from the direction in which the plume of smoke indicated the position of Merripit House, but the dip of the moor had hid her until she was quite close.

47242    I could not doubt that this was the Miss Stapleton of whom I had been told, since ladies of any sort must be few upon the moor, and I remembered that I had heard someone describe her as being a beauty.

47243    The woman who approached me was certainly that, and of a most uncommon type.

47244    There could not have been a greater contrast between brother and sister, for Stapleton was neutral tinted, with light hair and grey eyes, while she was darker than any brunette whom I have seen in England - slim, elegant, and tall.

47245    She had a proud, finely cut face, so regular that it might have seemed impassive were it not for the sensitive mouth and the beautiful dark, eager eyes.

47246    With her perfect figure and elegant dress she was, indeed, a strange apparition upon a lonely moorland path.