ng, hot, exciting day was
now at an end.

Yes, it was a pleasant room--bare, and yet furnished with everything
essential to comfort. Thus there was a good big, roomy arm-chair, a
writing-table, and a clock, of which the hands now pointed to a quarter
to one o'clock.

The broad, low bed, pushed back into an alcove as is the French fashion,
looked delightfully cool and inviting by the light of his one candle.

When M. Malfait had shown him into the room the window was wide open to
the hot, starless night, but the landlord, though he had left the window
open, had drawn the thick curtains across it. That was all right; Chester
had no wish to be wakened at five in the morning by the sunlight
streaming into the room. He meant to have a really long rest. He was
too tired to think--too tired to do anything but turn in.

And then an odd thing happened. Chester's brain was so thoroughly awake,
he had become so over-excited, that he could not, try as he might, fall
asleep.

He lay awake tossing about hour after hour. And then, when at last he did
fall into a heavy, troubled slumber, he was disturbed by extraordinary
and unpleasant dreams--nightmares in which Sylvia Bailey seemed to play
a part.

At last he roused himself and pulled back the curtains from across the
window. It was already dawn, but he thought the cool morning air might
induce sleep, and for a while, lying on his side away from the light, he
did doze lightly.

Quite suddenly he was awakened by the sensation, nay, the knowledge, that
there was someone in the room! So vivid was this feeling of unwished-for
companionship that he got up and looked in the shadowed recess of the
alcove in which stood his bed; but, of course, there was no one there.
In fact there would not have been space there for any grown-up person to
squeeze into.

He told himself that what he had heard--if he had heard anything--was
someone bringing him his coffee and rolls, and that the servant had
probably been trying to attract his attention, for, following his prudent
custom, he had locked his door the night before.

He unlocked the door and looked out, staring this way and that along the
empty passage. But no, in spite of the now-risen sun, it was still early
morning; the Pension Malfait was sunk in sleep.

Chester went back to bed. He felt tired, disturbed, uneasy; sleep was out
of the question; so he lay back, and with widely-open eyes, began to
think of Sylvia Bailey and of the st