Another window went the way of its fellows.

“You haven’t a revolver?” asked Adye.

Kemp’s hand went to his pocket.  Then he hesitated.  “I haven’t one—­at least to spare.”

“I’ll bring it back,” said Adye, “you’ll be safe here.”

Kemp, ashamed of his momentary lapse from truthfulness, handed him the weapon.

“Now for the door,” said Adye.

As they stood hesitating in the hall, they heard one of the first-floor bedroom windows crack and clash.  Kemp went to the door and began to slip the bolts as silently as possible.  His face was a little paler than usual.  “You must step straight out,” said Kemp.  In another moment Adye was on the doorstep and the bolts were dropping back into the staples.  He hesitated for a moment, feeling more comfortable with his back against the door.  Then he marched, upright and square, down the steps.  He crossed the lawn and approached the gate.  A little breeze seemed to ripple over the grass.  Something moved near him.  “Stop a bit,” said a Voice, and Adye stopped dead and his hand tightened on the revolver.

“Well?” said Adye, white and grim, and every nerve tense.

“Oblige me by going back to the house,” said the Voice, as tense and grim as Adye’s.

“Sorry,” said Adye a little hoarsely, and moistened his lips with his tongue.  The Voice was on his left front, he thought.  Suppose he were to take his luck with a shot?

“What are you going for?” said the Voice, and there was a quick movement of the two, and a flash of sunlight from the open lip of Adye’s pocket.

Adye desisted and thought.  “Where I go,” he said slowly, “is my own business.”  The words were still on his lips, when an arm came round his neck, his back felt a knee, and he was sprawling backward.  He drew clumsily and fired absurdly, and in another moment he was struck in the mouth and the revolver wrested from his grip.  He made a vain clutch at a slippery limb, tried to struggle up and fell back.  “Damn!” said Adye.  The Voice laughed.  “I’d kill you now if it wasn’t the waste of a bullet,” it said.  He saw the revolver in mid-air, six feet off, covering him.

“Well?” said Adye, sitting up.

“Get up,” said the Voice.

Adye stood up.

“Attention,” said the Voice, and then fiercely, “Don’t try any games.  Remember I can see your face if you can’t see mine.  You’ve got to go back to the house.”

“He won’t let me in,” said Adye.

“That’s a pity,” said the Invisible Man.  “I’ve got no quarrel with you.”

Adye moistened his lips again.  He glanced away from the barrel of the revolver and saw the sea far off very blue and dark under the midday sun, the smooth green down, the white cliff of the Head, and the multitudinous town, and suddenly he knew that life was very sweet.  His eyes came back to this little metal thing hanging between heaven and earth, six yards away.  “What am I to do?” he said sullenly.