ow-level inch by inch.
The violin-bow was between his teeth, and his hat hung over one eye in
the fashion of early dawn.

"It's Cott van Cott," said the invalid, slowly and critically. "He looks
quite an old man. Cott and his Strad. How very bad for the Strad!"

"Open the window. Where is it? Is there a way? Open the window!" roared
Cott, without removing the violin-bow.

Sister Ursula held up one hand warningly as she stooped over the
invalid.

For the second time did Cott van Cott misinterpret the gesture and
heaved himself upward, the violin and the bow clicking and rattling at
every stride. He was fleeing to the leads to save his life and his
violin from death by fire--fire in the basement--and the crowd in the
street roared below him with the roar of a full-fed conflagration.

The invalid fell back on the pillows and wiped his eyes. The hands of
the clock were on the hour appointed for the medicine, lacking only the
thirty seconds necessary for pouring it into a wine-glass. He took it
from Sister Ursula's hand, still shaking with helpless laughter.

[Illustration: "TOOK ONE LITTLE BRASS THIMBLE-LIKE THING FROM ITS
INSIDE."]

"God bless you, Sister Ursula," he said. "You've saved my life."

"The medicine was to be given," she answered simply. "I--I could not
help coming that way."

"If you only knew," said the invalid. "If you only knew! I saw it from
out of the windows. Good heavens! the dear old world is just the same as
ever. I must get back to it. I must positively get well and get back.
And, Sister Ursula, do you mind telling me when you're quite composed
everything that happened between the time the door shut and--and you
came in that way?"

After a little Sister Ursula told, and the invalid laughed himself faint
once more. When Sister Ursula re-settled the pillows, her hand fell on
the butt of a revolver that had come from the desk by the head of the
bed. She did not understand what it was, but the sight pained her.

"Wait a minute," said the invalid, and he took one little brass
thimble-like thing from its inside. "I--I wanted to use it for something
before you went out, but I saw you come up, and I don't want it any
more. I must certainly get back to the world again. Dear old world! Nice
old world! And Mrs. Cassidy prayed with you in the cellar, did she? And
Van Cott thought it was a fire? Do you know, Sister Ursula, that all
those things would have been impossible on any other planet? I'm goin