crash the right-hand window in the balcony flew wide
open, and like a cyclone, the wind swept through, clearing the table
in an instant of all the loose sheets of paper that had lain scattered
about it.

"'The devil! Why don't you shut the window!' I cried, springing up
from the sofa.

"'Spare your energy, it's too late,' said Lucien with a gentle mockery
in his soft voice. 'Look there!'--he pointed out into the street,
where his sheets of paper went swirling about in the heavy air like
white doves.

"A second later came the rain, a veritable cloud-burst. We shut the
windows and gave ourselves up to melancholy thoughts about the lost
manuscript, the recovery of which now seemed utterly hopeless.

"'That's one thousand francs, at least, that the wind has robbed me
of,' sighed Lucien. 'Well, _elfin_, that doesn't matter so much. But
do you know anything more tiresome than to work over the same subject
a second time? I can't think of doing it. It would fairly make me sick
to try it.'

"We were in a sad mood that morning. When we went out to breakfast at
about two o'clock, we looked about for some traces of the lost
manuscript.

"There was nothing to be seen. It had vanished completely, whirled off
to all four corners of the earth probably, this manuscript from which
Lucien had expected so much. Truly it was 'The Force of the Wind.'"

* * * * *

"Now comes the strange part of the story. One morning, two weeks
later, Lucien stood in the door of my little room, pale as a ghost. He
had a bundle of printer's proofs in his hand, and held them out to me
without a word.

"I looked at it and read:

"'"The Force of the Wind," by Lucien F.'

"It was a good bundle of proofs, the entire first proofs of Lucien's
novel, that novel the manuscript of which we had seen blown out of the
balcony window and whirled away by the winds.

"'My dear man,' I exclaimed, as I handed him back the proofs. 'You
_have_ been industrious indeed, to write your entire novel over again
in so short a time--and to have proofs already----'

"Lucien did not answer. He stood silent, staring at me with a weird
look in his otherwise so sensible eyes. After a moment he stammered:

"'I did not write the novel over again. I have not touched a pen since
the day the manuscript blew out of the window.'

"'Are you a sleep-walker, Lucien?'

"'Why do you ask?'

"'Why, that would be the only natural explanation. They say w