hen a gust of irritation stirred him.

"Damned fool I was to come here," he said... "DAMNED fool!

"Rush out of the place?...

"I've given my name."...

He heard the door behind him open and for a moment pretended not to
hear. Then he turned round. "I don't see what you can do for me," he
said.

"I'm sure _I_ don't," said the doctor. "People come here and talk."

There was something reassuringly inaggressive about the figure that
confronted Sir Richmond. Dr. Martineau's height wanted at least three
inches of Sir Richmond's five feet eleven; he was humanly plump, his
face was round and pink and cheerfully wistful, a little suggestive of
the full moon, of what the full moon might be if it could get fresh air
and exercise. Either his tailor had made his trousers too short or he
had braced them too high so that he seemed to have grown out of them
quite recently. Sir Richmond had been dreading an encounter with some
dominating and mesmeric personality; this amiable presence dispelled his
preconceived resistances.

Dr. Martineau, a little out of breath as though he had been running
upstairs, with his hands in his trouser pockets, seemed intent only on
disavowals. "People come here and talk. It does them good, and sometimes
I am able to offer a suggestion.

"Talking to someone who understands a little," he expanded the idea.

"I'm jangling damnably...overwork....."

"Not overwork," Dr. Martineau corrected. "Not overwork. Overwork never
hurt anyone. Fatigue stops that. A man can work--good straightforward
work, without internal resistance, until he drops,--and never hurt
himself. You must be working against friction."

"Friction! I'm like a machine without oil. I'm grinding to death....
And it's so DAMNED important I SHOULDN'T break down. It's VITALLY
important."

He stressed his words and reinforced them with a quivering gesture
of his upraised clenched hand. "My temper's in rags. I explode at any
little thing. I'm RAW. I can't work steadily for ten minutes and I can't
leave off working."

"Your name," said the doctor, "is familiar. Sir Richmond Hardy? In the
papers. What is it?"

"Fuel."

"Of course! The Fuel Commission. Stupid of me! We certainly can't afford
to have you ill."

"I AM ill. But you can't afford to have me absent from that Commission."

"Your technical knowledge--"

"Technical knowledge be damned! Those men mean to corner the national
fuel supply. And waste it! For their profits. That's