closes the curtains and cranes back.  They pass and die again.  She moves away and looking down at the floor between door and couch, as though seeing something there; shudders; covers her eyes; goes back to the couch and down again just as before, to stare at the embers.  Again she is startled by noise of the outer door being opened.  She springs up, runs and turns the light by a switch close to the door.  By the glimmer of the fire she can just be seen standing by the dark window-curtains, listening.  There comes the sound of subdued knocking on her door.  She stands in breathless terror.  The knocking is repeated.  The sound of a latchkey in the door is heard.  Her terror leaves her.  The door opens; a man enters in a dark, fur overcoat.]

Wanda. [In a voice of breathless relief, with a rather foreign accent] Oh! it’s you, Larry!  Why did you knock?  I was so frightened.  Come in! [She crosses quickly, and flings her arms round his neck] [Recoiling—­in a terror-stricken whisper] Oh!  Who is it?

Keith. [In a smothered voice] A friend of Larry’s.  Don’t be frightened.

She has recoiled again to the window; and when he finds the switch and turns the light up, she is seen standing there holding her dark wrapper up to her throat, so that her face has an uncanny look of being detached from the body.

[Gently] You needn’t be afraid.  I haven’t come to do you harm—­ quite the contrary. [Holding up the keys] Larry wouldn’t have given me these, would he, if he hadn’t trusted me?

     Wanda does not move, staring like a spirit startled out of the
     flesh.

[After looking round him] I’m sorry to have startled you.

Wanda. [In a whisper] Who are you, please?

Keith.  Larry’s brother.

     Wanda, with a sigh of utter relief, steals forward to the couch
     and sinks down.  Keith goes up to her.

He’d told me.

Wanda. [Clasping her hands round her knees.] Yes?

Keith.  An awful business!

Wanda.  Yes; oh, yes!  Awful—­it is awful!

Keith. [Staring round him again.] In this room?

Wanda.  Just where you are standing.  I see him now, always falling.

Keith. [Moved by the gentle despair in her voice] You—­look very young.  What’s your name?

Wanda.  Wanda.

Keith.  Are you fond of Larry?

Wanda.  I would die for him!

     [A moment’s silence.]

Keith.  I—­I’ve come to see what you can do to save him.

Wanda, [Wistfully] You would not deceive me.  You are really his brother?

Keith.  I swear it.

Wanda. [Clasping her hands] If I can save him!  Won’t you sit down?

Keith. [Drawing up a chair and sitting] This, man, your—­your husband, before he came here the night before last—­how long since you saw him?