Now there’s two ways to handle a situation like that:  one of them is to rouse the house—­and many a good sanatorium has been hurt by a scandal and killed by a divorce; the other way is to take one strong man who can hold his tongue, find the guilty person, and send him a fake telegram the next morning that his mother is sick.  I’ve done that more than once.

I sat down on the side of the bed and put on my slippers.

“What did he look like?” I asked.  “Could you see him?”

She uncovered one eye.

“Not—­not distinctly,” she said.  “I—­think he was large, and—­and rather handsome.  That beast of a dog must have got in my room and was asleep under the bed, for it wakened me by snarling.”

There was nothing in that to make me nervous, but it did.  As I put on my kimono I was thinking pretty hard.

I could not waken Mr. Pierce by knocking, so I went in and shook him.  He was sound asleep, with his arms over his head, and when I caught his shoulder he just took my hand and, turning over, tucked it under his cheek and went asleep again.

“Mr. Pierce!  Mr. Pierce!” He wakened a little at that, but not enough to open his eyes.  He seemed to know that the hand wasn’t his, however, for he kissed it.  And with that I slapped him and he wakened.  He lay there blinking at my candle and then he yawned.

“Musht have been ashleep!” he said, and turned over on his other side and shut his eyes.

It was two or three minutes at least before I had him sitting on the side of the bed, with a blanket spread over his knees, and was telling him about Miss Cobb.

“Miss Cobb!” he said.  “Oh, heavens, Minnie, tell her to go back to bed!” He yawned.  “If there’s anybody there it’s a mistake.  I’m sleepy.  What time is it?”

“I’m not going out of this room until you get up!” I declared grimly.

“Oh, very well!” he said, and put his feet back into bed.  “If you think I’m going to get up while you’re here—­”

After he seemed pretty well wakened I went out.  I waited in the sitting-room and I heard him growling as he put on his clothes.  When he came out, however, he was more cheerful, and he stopped in the hall to fish a case out of Mr. Sam’s dressing-gown pocket and light a cigarette.

“Now!” he said, taking my arm.  “Forward, the light-ly clad brigade!  But—­” he stopped—­“Minnie, we are unarmed!  Shall I get the patent folding corkscrew?”

He had to be quiet when we got to the bedroom floors, however, and when we stopped outside Miss Cobb’s door he was as sober as any one could wish him.

“You needn’t come in,” he whispered.  “Ten to one she dreamed it, but if she didn’t you’re better outside.  And whatever you hear, don’t yell.”

I gave him the key and he fitted it quietly in the lock.  Arabella, just inside, must have heard, for she snarled.  But the snarl turned into a yelp, as if she’d been suddenly kicked.