ion he sat down on the hard chair and smiled
happily. Friends is a lovely word to play with when one has been over
long neglected. He wished she would sit too, and make a pillow for his
head, but instead she was flitting from place to place acting in the
oddest way. From the camp bed she had dragged Blayney's kit bag and
was buttoning it into an old dressing gown provided for his use.

"I must have a head," she was saying, which sounded idiotic to Richard
who saw that her own was beautiful.

He pointed to a bronze bust of Van Diest which had been placed on the
mantelpiece a few days before, presumably to act as a reminder of the
influence dominating the apartment.

"Try that one," he suggested, laughing inanely.

But Auriole did not laugh. She gave a glad cry and called on him to
help. Together they carried the bust and soon had tied it securely
inside the dressing gown.

It did not occur to Richard to ask the reason why this strange dummy
had been created. It was all of a piece with the dream-like spirit
which pervaded everything. Her explanation was voluntary.

"It's to put in your bed," she said. "We'll take out the electric
bulbs, then start the bells going. When they come in and you don't
answer they'll go into the bedroom. They'll find this and think it's
you."

"Think this is me!" said Richard. "That's funny." He broke into a
storm of laughter which ended as abruptly as it began, ended from a
sudden realisation that all this folly and mummery was a real and solid
effort to compass his escape. "Wait a bit," he said, rubbing his brow
fiercely. "It's coming back. I see the idea. Bless you, for trying.
We'll have a shot."

He dragged the dummy into the inner room by the waist cord of the
dressing gown which was tied about its neck. The brain fog was gone.
He was surprisingly clear headed now, and an unnatural vitality buoyed
him up. The bedroom door swung to behind him and he heard Auriole cry:

"I'm doing the lights, be quick."

And at that moment he had a notion and acted upon it quickly. An old
gas bracket over the door helped the operation. When he had finished
he kicked over a chair and re-entered the now pitch dark room.

"I've got hold of the shutter bar," he heard her cry.

"Let her go," he answered.

And down in the hall below they heard the big alarm bell clang out the
warning.

Clinging to each other's hands they waited, their backs flattened
against the wall. And pre