too well for my own good,"
I said unsteadily. And the cab drove on.

CHAPTER XI. THE NAME WAS SULLIVAN

I had my arm done up temporarily in Baltimore and took the next train
home. I was pretty far gone when I stumbled out of a cab almost into the
scandalized arms of Mrs. Klopton. In fifteen minutes I was in bed, with
that good woman piling on blankets and blistering me in unprotected
places with hot-water bottles. And in an hour I had a whiff of
chloroform and Doctor Williams had set the broken bone.

I dropped asleep then, waking in the late twilight to a realization that
I was at home again, without the papers that meant conviction for
Andy Bronson, with a charge of murder hanging over my head, and with
something more than an impression of the girl my best friend was in love
with, a girl moreover who was almost as great an enigma as the crime
itself.

"And I'm no hand at guessing riddles," I groaned half aloud. Mrs.
Klopton came over promptly and put a cold cloth on my forehead.

"Euphemia," she said to some one outside the door, "telephone the doctor
that he is still rambling, but that he has switched from green ribbons
to riddles."

"There's nothing the matter with me, Mrs. Klopton," I rebelled. "I was
only thinking out loud. Confound that cloth: it's trickling all over
me!" I gave it a fling, and heard it land with a soggy thud on the
floor.

"Thinking out loud is delirium," Mrs. Klopton said imperturbably. "A
fresh cloth, Euphemia."

This time she held it on with a firm pressure that I was too weak to
resist. I expostulated feebly that I was drowning, which she also laid
to my mental exaltation, and then I finally dropped into a damp sleep.
It was probably midnight when I roused again. I had been dreaming of the
wreck, and it was inexpressibly comforting to feel the stability of my
bed, and to realize the equal stability of Mrs. Klopton, who sat, fully
attired, by the night light, reading Science and Health.

"Does that book say anything about opening the windows on a hot night?"
I suggested, when I had got my bearings.

She put it down immediately and came over to me. If there is one time
when Mrs. Klopton is chastened--and it is the only time--it is when
she reads Science and Health. "I don't like to open the shutters, Mr.
Lawrence," she explained. "Not since the night you went away."

But, pressed further, she refused to explain. "The doctor said you were
not to be excited," she persisted.