an I was
sitting with a few minutes ago? Ah, thank you"--as Colwyn stepped
forward and took the other arm--"now, let us take him gently upstairs."

The young man allowed himself to be led away without resistance. He
walked, or rather stumbled, along between his guides like a man in a
dream. Colwyn noticed that his eyes were half-closed, and that his head
sagged slightly from side to side as he was led along. A waiter held
open the glass doors which led into the lounge, and a palpitating
chambermaid, hastily summoned from the upper regions, tripped ahead up
the broad carpeted stairs and along the passage to show the way to the
young man's bedroom.

CHAPTER II

Sir Henry dismissed the chambermaid at the door, and Colwyn and he
lifted the young man on to the bed. He lay like a man in a stupor,
breathing heavily, his face flushed, his eyes nearly closed. Sir Henry
drew up the blind, and by the additional light examined him thoroughly,
listening closely to the action of his heart, and examining the pupils
of his eyes by rolling back the upper lid with some small instrument he
took from his pocket.

"He'll do now," he said, after loosening the patient's clothes for his
greater comfort. "He'll come to in about five minutes, and may be all
right again shortly afterwards. But there are certain peculiar features
about this case which are new in my experience, and rather alarm me.
Certainly the young man ought not to be left to himself. His friends
should be sent for. Do you know anything about him? Is he staying at the
hotel alone? I only arrived here last night."

"I believe he is staying at the hotel alone. He has been here for a
fortnight or more, and I have never seen him speak to anybody, though I
have exchanged nods with him every morning. His principal recreation
seems to lie in taking long solitary walks along the coast. He has been
in the habit of going out every day, and not returning until dinner is
half over. Perhaps the hotel proprietor knows who his friends are."

"Would you be so kind as to step downstairs and inquire? I do not wish
to leave him, but his friends should be telegraphed to at once and asked
to come and take charge of him."

"Certainly. And I'll send the telegram while I am down there."

But Colwyn returned in a few moments to say that the hotel proprietor
knew nothing of his guest. He had never stayed in the house before, and
he had booked his room by a trunk call from London. On arriva