Well, so long."

CHAPTER XXI

HOOVER'S

Jones, after the magic draught administered by Simms, entered into a
blissful condition of twilight sleep, half sleep, half drowsiness,
absolute indifference. He walked with assistance to the hall door and
entered a motor car, it did not matter to him what he entered or where
he went, he did not want to be disturbed.

He roused himself during a long journey to take a drink of something
held to his lips by someone, and sank back, tucking sleep around him
like a warm blanket.

In all his life he had never had such a gorgeous sleep as that, his
weary and harassed brain revelled in moments of semi-consciousness, and
then sank back into the last abysms of oblivion.

He awoke a new man, physically and mentally, and with an absolutely
clear memory and understanding. He awoke in a bed-room, a cheerful
bed-room, lit by the morning sun, a bed-room with an open window through
which came the songs of birds and the whisper of foliage.

A young man dressed in a black morning coat was seated in an armchair by
the window, reading a book. He looked like a superior sort of servant.

Jones looked at this young man, who had not yet noticed the awakening of
the sleeper, and Jones, as he looked at him, put facts together.

Simms, Cavendish, the fact that he had been doped, the place where he
was, and the young man. He had been taken here in that conveyance,
whatever it was; they had thought him mad--they had carted him off to a
mad-house, this was a mad-house, that guy in the chair was an attendant.
He recognized these probabilities very clearly, but he felt no anger and
little surprise. His mind, absolutely set up and almost renewed by
profound slumber, saw everything clearly and in a true light.

It was quite logical that, believing him mad, they had put him in a
mad-house, and he had no fear at all of the result simply because he
knew that he was sane. The situation was amusing, it was also one to get
free from--but there was plenty of time, and there was no room for
making mistakes.

Curiously enough, now, the passionate or almost passionate desire to
recover his own personality had vanished, or at least, was no longer
active in his mind; his brain, renewed by that tremendous sleep, was no
longer tainted by that vague dread, no longer troubled by that curious
craving to have others believe in his story and to have others recognize
him as Jones.

No, it did not matter to him j