his pipe. . . . Of course
they would find it. Here then was the end. Now for the first time
the horror of death came upon him, filing the room, turning it black,
killing the fire, the colour. His body was frozen with horror--already
his throat was choking, his eyes burning. The room swung slowly round
him, turning, turning. "They shan't take me. . . . They shan't take
me." His face was cruel, his mouth twisted. He saw the little silver box
lying there, open, exposed, upon the grass, glittering against the dull
green. He turned to the window with desperate, hunted eyes. Already he
fancied that he heard their steps upon the stair. He stood, his body
flung back, his hands pressing upon the table. "They shan't take me.
. . . They shan't take me." The door turned, slowly opened. It was Mrs.
Ridge with a duster. He gave a little sigh and rolled over, tumbling
back against the chair, unconscious.

3

"There, sir, now I _do_ 'ope as you'll be all right. Too much book-work,
_that's_ what it is, but if a doctor----"

Olva was lying in his chair now, very pale, his eyes closed.

"No, thank you, Mrs. Ridge. It's all right now, thank you--quite all
right. Yes, I'm ready for lunch--very silly of me."

Mrs. Ridge departed to fetch the luncheon-dish from the College kitchens
and to tell the porter Thompson all about it on the way. "Pore young
gentleman, there 'e was as you might say white as a sheet all of a 'eap.
It gave me a turn _I_ can assure you, Mr. Thompson."

His lunch was untasted. It seemed to him that he had now lost all power
of control. He could only face the inevitable fact of his approaching
capture. The sudden discovery of the loss of the matchbox had clanged
the facts about his ears with the discordant scream of closing gates.
He was captured, caught irretrievably, like a rat in a trap. He did
not wish to be caught like a rat in a trap. This was a free world.
Air, light, colour were about him on every side. To die, fighting, on
a hill-top, in a battle-field, that was one thing. To see them crowding
into his room, to be dragged into a dark airless place, to be caught by
the neck and throttled. . . .

Mrs. Ridge cleared away the lunch with much shaking of the head. Olva
lay in his chair watching, with eyes that never closed nor stirred, the
crackling golden fire. Beyond the window the world was of blue steel. He
could fancy the still gleaming waters of the lake that stretched beyond
the grass lawns; he could fa