the nurse.

"Yes. I'm over here on the divan."

"Anything wrong?"

"Good gracious, no! I'm overtired. A little hysterical, maybe. The
parade to-day, with all those wounded boys in automobiles, the music and
colour and excitement--have rather done me up. And the way I rushed up
here. And not finding Cutty--"

"Anything I can get for you?"

"No, thanks. I'll try to snatch a little sleep before Cutty returns."

"But he may be gone all night!"

"Will it be so very scandalous if I stay here?"

"You poor child! Go ahead and sleep. Don't hesitate to call me if you
want anything. I have a mild sedative if you would like it."

"No, thanks. I did not know that Mr. Hawksley played."

"Wonderfully! But does it bother you?"

"It kind of makes me choky."

"I'll tell him."

Kitty, now strangely at peace, snuggled down among the pillows.
Some great Polish violinist, who had roused the bitter enmity of the
anarchist? But no; he was Russian. Cutty had admitted that. It struck
her that Cutty knew a great deal more than Kitty Conover; and so far as
she could see there was no apparent reason for this secrecy. She rather
believed she had Cutty. Either he should tell her everything or she
would run loose, Bolshevik or no Bolshevik.

Sheep. She boosted one over the bars, another and another. Round
somewhere in the thirties the bars dissolved. The next thing she knew
she was blinking in the light, Cutty, his arms folded, staring down at
her sombrely. There was blood on his face and blood on his hands.

CHAPTER XX

Karlov moodily touched the shoulder of the man on the cot. Stefani
Gregor puzzled him. He came to this room more often than was wise,
driven by a curiosity born of a cynical philosophy to discover what it
was that reenforced this fragile body against threats and thirst and
hunger. He knew what he wanted of Gregor--the fiddler on his knees
begging for mercy. And always Gregor faced him with that silent calm
which reminded him of the sea, aloof, impervious, exasperating. Only
once since the day he had been locked in this room had Gregor offered
speech. He, Karlov, had roared at him, threatened, baited, but his
reward generally had been a twisted wintry smile.

He could not offer physical torture beyond the frequent omissions of
food and water; the body would have crumbled. To have planned this for
months, and then to be balked by something as visible yet as elusive
as quicksilver! Born in the same mudhole, a