“Perhaps,” she replied. “The fact is, I have just met — met some one whom I never expected to meet. That is all. Good night, dear friend.”

“Good night.”

She passed her hand soothingly over his forehead.

When we were alone Alresca seemed to be overtaken by lassitude.

“Surely,” I said, “it is not by Toddy — I mean Dr. Todhunter MacWhister’s advice that you keep these hours. The clocks are striking two!”

“Ah, my friend,” he replied wearily, in his precise and rather elaborate English, “ill or well, I must live as I have been accustomed to live. For twenty years I have gone to bed promptly at three o’clock