, and I could
not bear that he should think I had.

He fired.

My ears sang. The room was full of a new odour, and a cloud floated
reluctantly upwards from the mouth of the revolver. I sneezed, and then I
grew aware that, firing at a distant of two feet, he had missed me. What
had happened to the bullet I could not guess. He put the revolver down on
the table with a groan, and the handle rested on my satchel.

'My God, Magda!' he sighed, pushing back his hair with his
beautiful hand.

He was somewhat sobered. I said nothing, but I observed that the lamp was
smoking, and I turned down the wick. I was so self-conscious, so
irresolute, so nonplussed, that in sheer awkwardness, like a girl at a
party who does not know what to do with her hands, I pushed the revolver
off the satchel, and idly unfastened the catch of the satchel. Within it,
among other things, was my sedative. I, too, had fallen the victim of a
habit. For five years a bad sleeper, I had latterly developed into a very
bad sleeper, and my sedative was accordingly strong.

A notion struck me.

'Drink a little of this, my poor Diaz!' I murmured.

'What is it?' he asked.

'It will make you sleep,' I said.

With a convulsive movement he clutched the bottle and uncorked it, and
before I could interfere he had drunk nearly the whole of its contents.

'Stop!' I cried. 'You will kill yourself!'

'What matter!' he exclaimed; and staggered off to the darkness of
the bedroom.

I followed him with the lamp, but he had already fallen on the bed, and
seemed to be heavily asleep. I shook him; he made no response.

'At any cost he must he roused,' I said aloud. 'He must be forced to
walk.'

There was a knocking at the outer door, low, discreet, and continuous. It
sounded to me like a deliverance. Whoever might be there must aid me to
waken Diaz. I ran to the door, taking the key out of my pocket, and
opened it. A tall woman stood on the doormat. It was the girl that I had
glimpsed on the previous night in the large hat ascending the stairs with
a man. But now her bright golden head was uncovered, and she wore a blue
_peignoir_, such as is sold ready made, with its lace and its ribbons, at
all the big Paris shops.

We both hesitated.

'Oh, pardon, madame,' she said, in a thin, sweet voice in French. 'I was
at my door, and it seemed to me that I heard--a revolver. Nothing serious
has passed, then? Pardon, madame.'

'Nothing, thank you. You are very amiable