of a nature which he had never known in his
life before. Here, at any rate, was adventure!--and of a decidedly
unpleasant sort. He was not afraid for himself. He had a revolver in his
hip-pocket, loaded--he had been carrying it since Tuesday, with some
strange notion that it might be wanted. Certainly he might have to go
without food for perhaps many hours--but he suddenly remembered that in
the pocket of his Norfolk jacket he had a biggish box of first-rate
chocolate, which he had bought on his way to the cricket club meeting,
with a view of presenting it to Betty, later on. He could get through a
day on that, he thought, if it were necessary--as for the loaf of bread,
something seemed to nauseate him at the mere thought of trying to
swallow a mouthful of it.

The rest of the evening went: the silence was never broken. Not a sound
came from the mysterious chamber behind him. No step sounded on the
gravel without: no hand unlocked the door from the garden. Now and then
he heard the clock of the parish church strike the hours. At last he
slept--at first fitfully; later soundly--and when he woke it was
morning, and the sunlight was pouring in through the red-curtained
windows high in the walls of his prison.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE SPARROWS AND THE SPHERE

Neale was instantly awake and on the alert. He sprang to his feet,
shivering a little in spite of the rugs which he had wrapped about him
before settling down. A slight current of cold air struck him as he
rose--looking in the direction from which it seemed to come, he saw that
one of the circular windows in the high wall above him was open, and
that a fresh north-east wind was blowing the curtain aside. The
laboratory, hot and close enough when he had entered it the previous
evening, was now cool; the morning breeze freshened and sharpened his
wits. He pulled out his watch, which he had been careful to wind up
before lying down. Seven o'clock!--in spite of his imprisonment and his
unusual couch, he had slept to his accustomed hour of waking.

Knowing that Joseph Chestermarke might walk in upon him at any moment,
Neale kept himself on the look out, in readiness to adopt a determined
attitude whenever he was discovered. By that time he had come to the
conclusion that whether force would be necessary or not in any meeting
with Joseph, it would be no unwise thing to let that worthy see at once
that he had to deal with an armed man. He accordingly saw to it that his