The bulldog Smith, gazed up
at him expectantly. The game was a new one to Smith, but it seemed to
have possibilities. He was a dog who was always perfectly willing to try
anything once.

Mr. Bennett now began to address himself in earnest to the task of
calling for assistance. His physical discomfort was acute. Insects, some
winged, some without wings but--through Nature's wonderful law of
compensation--equipped with a number of extra pairs of legs, had begun
to fit out exploring expeditions over his body. They roamed about him as
if he were some newly opened recreation ground, strolled in couples down
his neck, and made up jolly family parties on his bare feet. And then,
first dropping like the gentle dew upon the place beneath, then swishing
down in a steady flood, it began to rain again.

It was at this point that Mr. Bennett's manly spirit broke and time
ceased to exist for him.

Aeons later, a voice spoke from below.

"Hullo!" said the voice.

Mr. Bennett looked down. The stalwart form of Jane Hubbard was standing
beneath him, gazing up from under a tam o'shanter cap. Smith, the
bulldog, gambolled about her shapely feet.

"Whatever are you doing up there?" said Jane. "I say, do you know if the
car has come back?"

"No. It has not."

"I've got to go to the doctor's. Poor little Mr. Hignett is ill. Oh,
well, I'll have to walk. Come along, Smith!" She turned towards the
drive, Smith caracoling at her side.

Mr. Bennett, though free now to move, remained where he was, transfixed.
That sinister word "ill" held him like a spell. Eustace Hignett was ill!
He had thought all along that the fellow was sickening for something,
confound him!

"What's the matter with him?" bellowed Mr. Bennett after Jane Hubbard's
retreating back.

"Eh?" queried Jane, stopping.

"What's the matter with Hignett?"

"I don't know."

"Is it infectious?"

"I expect so."

"Great Heavens!" cried Mr. Bennett, and, lowering himself cautiously to
the ground, squelched across the dripping grass.

In the hall, Webster the valet, dry and dignified, was tapping the
barometer with the wrist action of an ambassador knocking on the door of
a friendly monarch.

"A sharp downpour, sir," he remarked.

"Have you been in the house all the time?" demanded Mr. Bennett.

"Yes, sir."

"Didn't you hear me shouting?"

"I did fancy I heard something, sir."

"Then why the devil didn't you come to me?"

"I supposed it to be the owls, sir, a