renches
beyond Nivelle. Hundreds of pupae could not have died. Where, then, was his
error--if, indeed, he had made any?

Leaning from the window, he looked down at the frantic moth, perplexed, a
little uneasy now.

"Swine!" he muttered. "What, then, ails you that you do not fly to the
mistress awaiting you over yonder?"

He could see the cylinder of white tissue shining on the creature's body,
where it fluttered against the pane, illuminated by the rays of the candle
from within the young girl's room.

Could it be possible that the candle-light was proving the greater
attraction?

Even as the possibility entered his mind, he saw another Death's Head dart
at the window below and join the first one. But this newcomer wore no
tissue jacket.

Then, out of the darkness the Death's Heads began to come to the window
below, swarms of them, startling him with the racket of their wings.

From where did they arrive? They could not be the moths he liberated.
But.... _Were they?_ Had some accident robbed their bodies of the tissue
missives? Had they blundered into somebody's room and been robbed?

Mystified, uneasy, he hung over his window sill, staring with sickening
eyes at the winged tumult below.

With patient, plodding logic he began to seek for the solution. What
attracted these moths to the room below? Was it the candle-light? That
alone could not be sufficient--could not contend with the more imperious
attraction, the subtle effluvia stealing out of the north and appealing to
the ruling passion which animated the frantic winged things below him.

Patiently, methodically in his mind he probed about for some clue to the
solution. The ruling passion animating the feathery whirlwind below was
the necessity for mating and perpetuating the species.

That was the dominant passion; the lure of candle-light a secondary
attraction.... Then, if this were so--and it had been proven to be a
fact--then--then--_what_ was in that young girl's bedroom just below him?

Even as the question flashed in his mind he left the window, went to his
door, listened, noiselessly unlocked it.

A low murmur of voices came from the cafe.

He drew off both shoes, descended the stairs on the flat pads of his
large, bony feet, listening all the while.

Candle-light streamed out into the corridor from her open bedroom door;
and he crept to the sill and peered in, searching the place with small,
pale eyes.

At first he noticed nothing to int