It was now ten minutes past one.  I heard, through the dead silence, the soft drip of the rain and the tremulous passage of the night air through the trees.

After waiting irresolute, for a minute or more, in the middle of the room, he moved to the corner near the window, where the Indian cabinet stood.

He put his candle on the top of the cabinet.  He opened, and shut, one drawer after another, until he came to the drawer in which the mock Diamond was put.  He looked into the drawer for a moment.  Then he took the mock Diamond out with his right hand.  With the other hand, he took the candle from the top of the cabinet.

He walked back a few steps towards the middle of the room, and stood still again.

Thus far, he had exactly repeated what he had done on the birthday night.  Would his next proceeding be the same as the proceeding of last year?  Would he leave the room?  Would he go back now, as I believed he had gone back then, to his bed-chamber?  Would he show us what he had done with the Diamond, when he had returned to his own room?

His first action, when he moved once more, proved to be an action which he had not performed, when he was under the influence of the opium for the first time.  He put the candle down on a table, and wandered on a little towards the farther end of the room.  There was a sofa there.  He leaned heavily on the back of it, with his left hand—­then roused himself, and returned to the middle of the room.  I could now see his eyes.  They were getting dull and heavy; the glitter in them was fast dying out.

The suspense of the moment proved too much for Miss Verinder’s self-control.  She advanced a few steps—­then stopped again.  Mr. Bruff and Betteredge looked across the open doorway at me for the first time.  The prevision of a coming disappointment was impressing itself on their minds as well as on mine.

Still, so long as he stood where he was, there was hope.  We waited, in unutterable expectation, to see what would happen next.

The next event was decisive.  He let the mock Diamond drop out of his hand.

It fell on the floor, before the doorway—­plainly visible to him, and to everyone.  He made no effort to pick it up:  he looked down at it vacantly, and, as he looked, his head sank on his breast.  He staggered—­roused himself for an instant—­walked back unsteadily to the sofa—­and sat down on it.  He made a last effort; he tried to rise, and sank back.  His head fell on the sofa cushions.  It was then twenty-five minutes past one o’clock.  Before I had put my watch back in my pocket, he was asleep.

It was all over now.  The sedative influence had got him; the experiment was at an end.

I entered the room, telling Mr. Bruff and Betteredge that they might follow me.  There was no fear of disturbing him.  We were free to move and speak.

“The first thing to settle,” I said, “is the question of what we are to do with him.  He will probably sleep for the next six or seven hours, at least.  It is some distance to carry him back to his own room.  When I was younger, I could have done it alone.  But my health and strength are not what they were—­I am afraid I must ask you to help me.”