“Miss Gaines, I am dreadfully sorry you should have been frightened.  But there really wasn’t the least occasion for alarm.  Because Miss Smith was with me,” said Mr. Jelnik calmly.

Alicia looked at him, trying to read his face in the wan light.  Her world, as it were, was rocking under her feet.  She looked at me; and I said nothing.  To save my life I couldn’t speak of Jessamine Hynds then, nor talk coherently of that night’s experience.  I couldn’t betray Nicholas Jelnik’s secrets, nor mention the Watcher in the Dark, nor that dreadful red-walled room.  So I merely patted Alicia’s shoulder, while she held fast to me as if I might again disappear.

“That is exactly what we should like you to explain, Mr. Jelnik, if you please,” said The Author, with deadly politeness.  “You must pardon us if we disagree with your assertion that Miss Gaines had no real occasion for alarm.”

“Miss Smith and I,” said Mr. Jelnik, stiffening, at the tone, “found it absolute necessary to leave Hynds House for a short while to-night, to attend to—­an affair of some importance to us both, but which concerns no one else on earth.”  Under the grave politeness his voice had an edge of irritation.  “I repeat that I am sincerely sorry Miss Alicia was frightened.  For my share in that, I crave her pardon.  I ask all of you to accept this apology as an explanation which is final.”

“I for one shall do no such thing!” cried The Author, hotly.  “Are we impertinent children to be thus lightly dismissed?  Of course, if Miss Smith herself—­”

“You have neither right nor authority to cross-question Miss Smith,” interposed Mr. Jelnik, sharply.  But Doctor Geddes broke in, with mounting anger and astonishment: 

“Of course we’ve got the right and the reason to question both of you!  You might just as well come off your high horse; you’ve behaved very badly, Jelnik!  To induce Sophy to scuttle off in the middle of the night, without a word to anybody, and go wild-goose-chasing with you, was an unworthy action.  I wouldn’t have believed it of you, Jelnik; I thought you had more common sense—­not to speak of Sophy herself.  Gad, I’d like to shake the pair of you!” And he stamped his feet.

“Doctor Richard Geddes,” said Mr. Jelnik, in dangerously low and honeyed tones, “I find you insufferable.  You have the instincts and the manners of a navvy.”

“Mr. Jelnik!” cried The Author.  “Mr. Jelnik, honor me, please, by considering my instincts and manners infinitely worse than Doctor Geddes’s.  I, Mr. Jelnik, at this instant feel within me the instincts of a cave man and I hone for the thigh-bone of an aurochs to prove it to you.  Do you know what I think of you, Mr. Jelnik?  I consider you a man without conscience and without scruples, sir!”

“My faith!  The man even talks like a serial!” said Mr. Jelnik, weariedly.  “My dear, good sir, while we’re by way of indulging in personalities permit me to inform you that you annoy me by existing.  As to your behavior to Miss Smith—­”