_Paul!_"

It came from the kitchen.

And in the same moment it flashed upon Oleron, he knew not how, that two,
three, five, he knew not how many minutes before, another sound, unmarked
at the time but suddenly transfixing his attention now, had striven to
reach his intelligence. This sound had been the slight touch of metal on
metal--just such a sound as Oleron made when he put his key into the
lock.

"Hallo!... Who's that?" he called sharply from his bed.

He had no answer.

He called again. "Hallo!... Who's there?... Who is it?"

This time he was sure he heard noises, soft and heavy, in the kitchen.

"This is a queer thing altogether," he muttered. "By Jove, I'm as weak as
a kitten too.... Hallo, there! Somebody called, didn't they?... Elsie! Is
that you?..."

Then he began to knock with his hand on the wall at the side of his bed.

"Elsie!... Elsie!... You called, didn't you?... Please come here, whoever
it is!..."

There was a sound as of a closing door, and then silence. Oleron began to
get rather alarmed.

"It may be a nurse," he muttered; "Elsie'd have to get me a nurse, of
course. She'd sit with me as long as she could spare the time, brave
lass, and she'd get a nurse for the rest.... But it was awfully like her
voice.... Elsie, or whoever it is!... I can't make this out at all. I
must go and see what's the matter...."

He put one leg out of bed. Feeling its feebleness, he reached with his
hand for the additional support of the wall....

* * * * *

But before putting out the other leg he stopped and considered, picking
at his new-found beard. He was suddenly wondering whether he _dared_ go
into the kitchen. It was such a frightfully long way; no man knew what
horror might not leap and huddle on his shoulders if he went so far;
when a man has an overmastering impulse to get back into bed he ought to
take heed of the warning and obey it. Besides, why should he go? What
was there to go for? If it was that Bengough creature again, let her look
after herself; Oleron was not going to have things cramp themselves on
his defenceless back for the sake of such a spoilsport as _she_!... If
she was in, let her let herself out again, and the sooner the better for
her! Oleron simply couldn't be bothered. He had his work to do. On the
morrow, he must set about the writing of a novel with a heroine so
winsome, capricious, adorable, jealous, wicked, beautiful, inflaming, and
altog