voice of the visitor who had been lunching with him
was heard on the stairs. He seemed to be speaking with the door handle
in his hand.

'You see a doctor, old boy,' he said; 'all that about
thought-transference is just simply twaddle. You've been over-working.
Take a holiday. Go to Dieppe.'

'I'd rather go to Babylon,' said the learned gentleman.

'I wish you'd go to Atlantis some time, while we're about it, so as to
give me some tips for my Nineteenth Century article when you come home.'

'I wish I could,' said the voice of the learned gentleman. 'Goodbye.
Take care of yourself.'

The door was banged, and the visitor came smiling down the stairs--a
stout, prosperous, big man. The children had to get up to let him pass.

'Hullo, Kiddies,' he said, glancing at the bandages on the head of Cyril
and the hand of Robert, 'been in the wars?'

'It's all right,' said Cyril. 'I say, what was that Atlantic place you
wanted him to go to? We couldn't help hearing you talk.'

'You talk so VERY loud, you see,' said Jane soothingly.

'Atlantis,' said the visitor, 'the lost Atlantis, garden of the
Hesperides. Great continent--disappeared in the sea. You can read about
it in Plato.'

'Thank you,' said Cyril doubtfully.

'Were there any Amulets there?' asked Anthea, made anxious by a sudden
thought.

'Hundreds, I should think. So HE'S been talking to you?'

'Yes, often. He's very kind to us. We like him awfully.'

'Well, what he wants is a holiday; you persuade him to take one. What
he wants is a change of scene. You see, his head is crusted so thickly
inside with knowledge about Egypt and Assyria and things that you can't
hammer anything into it unless you keep hard at it all day long for days
and days. And I haven't time. But you live in the house. You can hammer
almost incessantly. Just try your hands, will you? Right. So long!'

He went down the stairs three at a time, and Jane remarked that he was a
nice man, and she thought he had little girls of his own.

'I should like to have them to play with,' she added pensively.

The three elder ones exchanged glances. Cyril nodded.

'All right. LET'S go to Atlantis,' he said.

'Let's go to Atlantis and take the learned gentleman with us,' said
Anthea; 'he'll think it's a dream, afterwards, but it'll certainly be a
change of scene.'

'Why not take him to nice Egypt?' asked Jane.

'Too hot,' said Cyril shortly.

'Or Babylon, where he wants to go?'

'I've had enou