stooping, weak of face and light-haired, with eyes that blinked and trembled behind great spectacles and who, for comfort, hugged about him a gorgeous kimono.  For an instant the newcomers stared stupidly through the smoke at the bodies on the floor breathing stertorously, at the young man with the lust of battle still in his face, at the girl shrinking against the wall.  It was the young man in the serge suit who was the first to move.

“Who are you?” he demanded.

“These are burglars,” said the owner of the car.  “We happened to be passing in my automobile, and——­”

The young man was no longer listening.  With an alert, professional manner he had stooped over the big burglar.  With his thumb he pushed back the man’s eyelids, and ran his fingers over his throat and chin.  He felt carefully of the point of the chin, and glanced up.

“You’ve broken the bone,” he said.

“I just swung on him,” said the young man.  He turned his eyes, and suggested the presence of the girl.

At the same moment the man in the kimono cried nervously:  “Ladies present, ladies present.  Go put your clothes on, everybody; put your clothes on.”

For orders the men in the doorway looked to the young man with the stern face.

He scowled at the figure in the kimono.

“You will please go to your room, sir,” he said.  He stood up, and bowed to Miss Forbes.  “I beg your pardon,” he asked, “you must want to get out of this.  Will you please go into the library?”

He turned to the robust youths in the door, and pointed at the second burglar.

“Move him out of the way,” he ordered.

The man in the kimono smirked and bowed.

“Allow me,” he said; “allow me to show you to the library.  This is no place for ladies.”

The young man with the stern face frowned impatiently.

“You will please return to your room, sir,” he repeated.

With an attempt at dignity the figure in the kimono gathered the silk robe closer about him.

“Certainly,” he said.  “If you think you can get on without me—­I will retire,” and lifting his bare feet mincingly, he tiptoed away.  Miss Forbes looked after him with an expression of relief, of repulsion, of great pity.

The owner of the car glanced at the young man with the stern face, and raised his eyebrows interrogatively.

The young man had taken the revolver from the limp fingers of the burglar and was holding it in his hand.  Winthrop gave what was half a laugh and half a sigh of compassion.

“So, that’s Carey?” he said.

There was a sudden silence.  The young man with the stern face made no answer.  His head was bent over the revolver.  He broke it open, and spilled the cartridges into his palm.  Still he made no answer.  When he raised his head, his eyes were no longer stern, but wistful, and filled with an inexpressible loneliness.