me, in watching the
colour flowing gradually back into Constance's face; a singularly
beautiful process of nature I thought it. Presently the door of the room
opened with a jerk, and a tallish man wearing a silk hat looked in.

"H'm!" he said brusquely. "Beg pardon!" And he was gone. I learned
afterwards that the room belonged to him, and that he came direct from a
conference of newspaper pundits called together at Westminster by the
Home Secretary. I do not know where he took refuge, but as for us we
went on with our soup and bread till repletion overtook us, as it
quickly does after long fasts, and renewed strength brought sighs of
contentment.

"Wardle," I remember saying to my journalistic friend, with absurd
earnestness, "have you anything to smoke?"

"I haven't a thing but my pipe," he said. "But wait a moment! There used
to be--yes. Look here!"

There was a drawer in a side-table near the great writing-table, and one
division of it was half-full of cigarettes, the other of Upman's
"Torpedoes."

"I will repay thee," I murmured irreverently, as I helped myself to one
of each, and lit the cigarette, having obtained permission from
Constance. It was the first tobacco I had tasted for forty-eight hours,
and I was a very regular smoker. I had not known my need till then, a
fact which will tell much to smokers.

"And now?" said Constance. Her eyelids were drooping heavily.

"Now I am going to take you straight out to South Kensington, and you
are going to rest."

I had never used quite that tone to Constance before. I think, till now,
hers had been the guiding and directing part. Yet her influence had
never been stronger upon me than at that moment.

"Well, of course, there are no cabs or omnibuses," said Wardle, "but a
man told me the Underground was running trains at six o'clock."

We had a long, long wait at Blackfriars' station, but a train came
eventually, and we reached the flat in South Kensington as a
neighbouring church clock struck ten. The journey was curious and
impressive from first to last. Fleet Street had been very much alive
still when we left it; and we saw long files of baggage wagons rumbling
along between Prussian lancers. But Blackfriars was deserted, the ticket
collector slept soundly on his box; the streets in South Kensington were
silent as the grave.

London slept that night for the first time in a week. I learned
afterwards how the long lines of German sentries in Pall Mall, Park