"I don't need you to tell me that," said I.

We went downstairs to put on our coats and then round to the garage to
hurry up the car.

"There's some dreadful trouble at Mr. Boldero's," I said to the
chauffeur. "You must drive like the devil."

Barbara, veiled and coated, met us at the front door. She has a trick of
doing things by lightning. We started; Barbara and Jaffery at the back,
I sideways to them on one of the little chair seats. We had the car
open, as it was a muggy day. . . . It is astonishing how such trivial
matters stick in one's mind. . . . We went, as I had ordained, like the
devil.

"Who sent that telegram?" asked Barbara.

"Doria," said I.

"I think it's Adrian," said Jaffery.

"I think," said Barbara, "it's that silly old woman, Adrian's mother.
Either of the others would have said something definite. Ah!" she smote
her knee with her small hand, "I hate people with spinal marrow and no
backbone to hold it!"

We tore through Maidenhead at a terrific pace, the Christmas traffic in
the town clearing magically before us. Sometimes a car on an errand of
life or death is recognised, given way to, like a fire engine.

"What makes you so dead sure something's happened to Adrian?" Jaffery
asked me as we thundered through the railway arch.

Then I remembered. I had told him little or nothing of my fears. Ever
since I learned that Adrian was putting the finishing touches to his
novel, I had dismissed them from my mind. Such accounts as I had given
of Adrian had been in a jocularly satirical vein. I had mentioned his
pontifical attitude, the magnification of his office, his bombastic
rhetoric over the Higher Life and the Inspiration of the Snows, and, all
that being part and parcel of our old Adrian, we had laughed. Six months
before I would have told Jaffery quite a different story. But now that
Adrian had practically won through, what was the good of reviving the
memory of ghastly apprehensions?

"Tell me," said Jaffery. "There's something behind all this."

I told him. It took some time. We sped through Slough and Hounslow, and
past the desolate winter fields. The grey air was as heavy as our
hearts.

"In plain words," said Jaffery, "it's G.P.--General Paralysis of the
Insane."

"That's what I fear," said I.

"And you?" He turned to Barbara.

"I too. Hilary has told you the truth."

"But Doria! Good God! Doria! It will kill her!"

Barbara put her little gloved fingers on Jaffery's great