“Oh, but really, Mr. Vivian, I—­”

“Kindly follow me.”

Lady Enid hesitated for a moment, but the Prophet’s manner was too much for her, and when he stepped, like a clockwork automaton with a steel interior, towards the staircase, she crept mildly in his wake.

“Can’t I really—?” she whispered in his ear.

“Certainly not.  If you were a married woman, possibly—­”

“Well, but I am engaged,” she murmured.

The Prophet stopped short.

“Engaged!” he said.  “To whom?”

“Sir Tiglath.”

“Engaged to Sir Tiglath!”

“Yes.  He proposed to me to-night at Zoological House.”

“Why?”

She might well have resented the question, but perhaps she divined the distraught and almost maniacal condition of mind that the Prophet masked beneath his impassive demeanour.  At any rate she answered frankly,—­

“Because he didn’t find out I’m Miss Minerva, and in the midst of Mrs. Bridgeman’s silly world I stood right out as the only sensible creature living.  Isn’t it fun?”

“Fun!”

“Yes.  I always meant him to propose to me.”

“Why?”

“Because I always thought it would be supremely idiotic of me to accept him.”

The Prophet felt that if he listened to another remark of such a nature his brain would snap and he would instantly be taken with a tearing fit of hysterics.  He therefore turned round and slowly ascended to the first floor.

“Kindly step into the drawing-room,” he said, having first, by a rapid glance, assured himself that Malkiel was not changing Mr. Ferdinand’s trousers there.  “I will send Mrs. Fancy to chaperon you.”

Lady Enid stepped in obediently, and the Prophet, who could distinctly hear Mrs. Fancy sobbing on the landing above, proceeded thither, took her hand and guided her down to the drawing-room.

“Oh, my poor, poor missis!” gulped the devoted creature.  “Oh, my—­”

“Precisely,” rejoined the Prophet, with passionless equanimity.  “Please go in there and remain to guard this young lady.”

He assisted Mrs. Fancy to fall in a heap upon the nearest sociable, and then, still moving with a species of frozen deliberation, betook himself once more to the hall.  The astronomer and Gustavus were standing there in silence.

“Sir Tiglath,” said the Prophet, in a very formal manner, “you can now begin to search for this ruffian.”

Sir Tiglath cleared his throat, and continued to stand still.

“I hope you will find him,” continued the Prophet.

Sir Tiglath cleared his throat again and added,—­

“Why?”

“Why?  Because I think it quite time that he was murdered,” answered the Prophet, unemotionally.  “Well! why don’t you search?”

The astronomer, whose face began to look less red than usual, rolled his glassy eyes round upon the shadowy hall, the dim staircase and the gloomy-looking closed doors that confronted them.