Bassett was buried by lantern-light a little after one in the morning in a far corner of the club grounds. His was the fourth grave there, and not one of the four men had died in his bed. The Rev. Cyril Mast read the service sonorously, with dignity and self-control, for Soames Pryce had seen to him, and Soames Pryce was a clever doctor. The roughly-made coffin—a wooden framework with thick mats stretched over it—was borne by members of the club, and it was they who had dug the grave and afterwards filled it in. No native had ever been allowed to have anything to do with the interment of a white man.

Most of the members were present at the funeral, but not all. Lord Charles Baringstoke was not there, but he expressed his regrets afterwards, leaning against the wall in the card-room with a cigarette in one side of his loose mouth.

“I’d always meant to see the beggar planted, but, you see, I didn’t know when the thing was going to start. So we’d one rubber to fill in time. Then, just when the lights went past the window, we were game and twenty-eight, and it looked like our only being five minutes late anyhow; but I got my spades doubled and the little slam up against me, and then they made an odd trick in hearts, and we were finally bust on a dam-silly no-trumper of my partner’s. Still, I’m sorry you know, though it couldn’t be helped. Everybody going to bed? One more little drink—what?”

Already on the screen in the hall there was a notice calling an emergency meeting of the members in the afternoon for the election of an honorary secretary who would also be a member of the committee. Neither Pryce nor Mast had cared to undertake the secretarial work.

Standing by the screen, Sir John Sweetling, in conversation with some of the more responsible members of the club, pronounced the panegyric upon Bassett. “He never, or very rarely, drank; he liked business, and he kept the books well.” Sir John paused a moment in thought, and added, “And he wrote an excellent hand.”

“And paid nodings for it,” said round-eyed Mr Mandelbaum. “But zen it put him in ze know.”

It was long before Sir John could get any sleep that night. His mind was still active and anxious. The old questions still bothered him. What compact, if any, had been made between King Smith and Lechworthy? Was it just possible that the King had not given the Exiles’ Club away? If he had, which seemed almost certain, would Pryce be able to carry out what he had undertaken? Would Pryce be able to save himself when the Snowflake was scuttled or burned? And then there were many worries in connection with the club. Who could be found to take Bassett’s place? What could be done about Cyril Mast, whose folly was the cause of all that had happened? Some advantage might be taken of his repentance.

It seemed to Sir John that he had only been asleep for a few minutes when he was awakened by a loud knock at his door. It was just daylight. Sir John was rather startled. He glanced at his revolver on the table by his bedside and shouted “Come in.”

“Sorry to disturb you,” said Dr Pryce, as he entered. He was dressed, and he sat down and laced his boots as he talked. “But I’ve got to be off. A letter was brought to me ten minutes ago from Lechworthy. His niece is ill—seriously ill, I should say, and he wants me at once. He seems to have sent the letter through the King—at any rate Smith’s waiting for me in a buggy outside.”

Sir John was wide awake and out of bed by now. He thrust his feet into a pair of soft red leather slippers. He was quite a good figure of a man, but his tendency to corpulence was more noticeable in his yellow silk pyjamas, and one gets untidy at night. “But this is a new move, Pryce,” he said. “This secures your passage on the Snowflake.” He peered into the looking-glass and used two hairbrushes quickly. Then he suddenly wheeled round, with the brushes still in his hands. “By God! it settles everything. You needn’t go near the Snowflake. Don’t you see?”

“Thought you’d come to it. You mean that I poison the girl and her uncle. Smith has to come back to us because he has no one else. The skipper and crew will know nothing, and will be told a tale. That’s it, eh?”

“Of course, though it needn’t be put quite like that. The best of doctors cannot save every patient. Lechworthy would be distracted, and a sleeping-draught might be necessary—and a mistake might occur. That’s the way I’m going to put it—to Smith, to the men here, to everybody. You can trust me.”

“Absolutely. But you’re in too much of a hurry. I’m not going to do it.”

“Why not? Because you’re called in as a doctor? Man, our lives are at stake. Let’s be frank. I won’t face a trial and penal servitude to follow. Would you? You were ready to do much worse than this. It isn’t a time for—”

“I know,” said the doctor. He had finished with his boots now, and stood upright. “It’s not exactly a point of professional etiquette. The thing simply isn’t sport. It’s too easy and too dirty.”

“But this isn’t reasonable. You’re willing to sink the Snowflake and—and all that’s implied in that.”

“Willing to try. The scuttling of a schooner is not too easy. Teetotal millionaires can afford luxuries, and you may bet there’s a good sober skipper and a picked crew on board the Snowflake. They will be awake. If I were caught cutting a pipe, or fooling with the sea-cocks, or doing something surgical to the boats, I think—well, objections would be raised. Also, the problem of the one survivor takes some thinking out. It’s likely there would be too many survivors or none at all. It’s blackguardly enough, but still there is an element of risk about it. As for the other thing, well, to cut it short, I won’t do it.”

“Then I must leave it,” said Sir John. “I think you’re missing a chance, but that can’t be helped. When do you return?”

“Can’t say. To-night perhaps, if the patient doesn’t need me. Well, good-bye, Sweetling. Get ’em to elect Hanson secretary if you can. If I can’t come I’ll write.”

Sir John crept back again into bed. He did not mean to break with Pryce, and he had shown less anger than he felt. He was not really surprised at Pryce’s prompt and definite refusal. He had dealt with many bad men—some worse than the doctor—and he was a bad man himself; and he had come constantly on the bad thing that the bad man would not do. He had found the distorted sense of honour in men who had done some dishonourable things. He had found generosity in thieves and tender-heartedness in a murderer. Even as the good sometimes fall, so do the bad sometimes rise.

And, after all, the summons of Dr Pryce to the palace to attend Lechworthy’s niece was all to the good. He would be in the position of a spy in the enemy’s camp. Probably, by the evening, he would return with news of the relations of Lechworthy and the King. Uncertainties would be cleared up, and it would be easier to see what to do. And yet another point occurred to Sir John. Suppose that Pryce saved the life of Lechworthy’s niece, Lechworthy’s gratitude would be unbounded, and he would be ready to do anything to show it. Pryce would refuse money, but he might ask Lechworthy to leave the Exiles’ Club alone, to refrain from policeman’s work, to do nothing which would give the secret away. Thus thinking, Sir John fell asleep again.

He rose late, breakfasted in his room, and then sought out the Rev. Cyril Mast.

“I want you,” said Sir John. “Pryce has been called away, and we are the only two on the committee for the moment. Come to the secretary’s room.”

“Very well,” said Mast, dejectedly, and followed him.

The two sat at the table facing one another. Mast’s red-rimmed eyes fell on the little glass of small shot with which Bassett had been wont to clean his pens. He could recall the nervous jabbing movement of Bassett’s hand as he did it. Bassett’s three cork penholders lay in a tray before him.

“You can say what you like,” said Mast. “Whatever you say I deserve it. I ought never to have brought the Lechworthys here. I couldn’t foresee that Bassett would come out and Lechworthy would recognise him. It was all wrong, though.”

“Why did you do it?”

“Do you never feel sometimes that you’d like to talk to a few decent people who didn’t know your history? I’ve been nearly mad. And—well, it was you who began it.”

“Indeed? And what had I got to do with it?”

“You didn’t mean it, and you’ll probably laugh at it. It was about a fortnight ago, and we’d just finished a committee meeting after dinner. There were Pryce, Bassett, you and I sitting out on the verandah. Bassett kept jigging about in a wicker chair that squeaked horribly, and you said you’d give us some better music than that, you remember?”

“Yes, I remember. What about it?”

“You pulled out that swagger presentation watch of yours—the one that plays the tunes—and set it going. The night was quite still, and I sat listening to the tinky-tink of ‘Home, sweet Home.’ That brought back Histon Boys to my mind—village where I was, you know. Old chaps hobbling out of church, bad with rheumatism; they used to touch their hats to me then. They didn’t know. I was welcome anywhere in the village. I dined with the farmers and played tennis with their pretty daughters. People walked in from the next village, three miles away, to hear me preach on Sunday evenings. Yes, it won’t seem much to you, but I’ve lost it all, and I can never have it again or anything like it. Why, if I showed myself in Histon Boys now, they’d set their dogs on me. That infernal tune made me think, and thinking drove me mad.”

“I’m not concerned with your sins, Mr Mast. Being a parson you repent ’em, and being what you are, you repeat ’em. You spend your time in alternate sobbing and soaking. But I’m concerned with your follies, because they’re dangerous. You showed yourself a dangerous fool in the matter of the native women. You’ve showed yourself still more dangerous in bringing Lechworthy here. Lechworthy’s hand-in-glove with the King. Lechworthy may sail for home with a list of our names in his pocket-book.”

“I realise all that,” said Mast. “If there’s anything I can do about Lechworthy I’ll do it. I don’t care what it is.”

“Remember you’ve said that. I may take you at your word later. At present that matter is in the hands of a stronger man than you are. Lechworthy’s niece is ill, and Dr Pryce is attending her. Something may be worked that way.”

“I don’t see how.”

“Don’t you? Well, there are more ways than one of paying the doctor who saves the life of somebody to whom you’re devoted. But don’t bother about that yet. At present that’s in Dr Pryce’s hands and mine. You’ve made an unlimited offer, and I think you were right to make it—you’ve risked the skins of every man in the club, and you ought to be ready to risk your own skin to save them. Probably it won’t come to that, but if it does I’ll tell you. Meanwhile there’s another thing to settle. Who’s to be secretary?”

“Mandelbaum says he would take it if a small salary were attached. He has asked me to propose that.”

“We can’t pay a salary and I wouldn’t take Mandelbaum if he paid to come in. He must find somebody else to propose that nonsense. You can tell him I said so if you like. Mandelbaum doesn’t happen to be one of the things I’m afraid of just now. The fact is, Mast—and you’re a good deal responsible for it—we are getting too disorganised and demoralised here. I don’t want to turn the place into a Sunday-school, but I will have some decency and order. And I want a strong committee, because in consequence of this Lechworthy incident it may be necessary for the whole club to take action as the committee directs. Pryce is all right, but you admit your own weakness. You were elected, because you had the gift of the gab, and you can make it useful to us. I want you to propose Hanson. Bassett was never a strong man, and that fat German who flatters himself that he’s worth a salary is no better. Hanson is the man. He’s steady and he knows things.”

“I’ll do my best for him,” said Mast. “I must not canvass, of course.”

“It’s no good; it would work the other way. But if you get a chance between now and luncheon of getting your knife into Mandelbaum’s election, don’t miss it.”

“I see,” said Mast. He was glad that he was to make a speech; it was a thing that he did well.

“And don’t forget—you owe a debt to the club, and you’ve told me that you’re ready to pay when I call on you.”

Sir John was satisfied with this interview. The Rev. Cyril Mast would be a second string to Sir John’s bow. The second string was not of the strongest, and probably would not be wanted. But if, for example, some further divergence occurred between the views of Sir John and those of Dr Pryce, Sir John thought he might find that second string useful.

The meeting that afternoon was brief and without excitement. Mast proposed Hanson in a short but admirable speech. Mast, with the appearance of a dissipated boy, had on public occasions the elegant and sonorous delivery of a comfortable archdeacon. His prepared speeches had point and a dry wit that was quite absent from his ordinary conversation. Mandelbaum withdrew, in a few pathetic words that caused much amusement, and Hanson was elected unanimously.

The new secretary was a quiet and reserved man of middle age. Eight years before he had been a prosperous Lancashire manufacturer. Then for a week he had gone mad; and as his madness did not happen to be of a certifiable kind, he was now paying for it with the rest of his life in exile. He was the best chess-player in the club and perhaps the best all-round shot; with the revolver Dr Soames Pryce was in a class by himself. Hanson spent four hours every day over chess. He used work where the Rev. Cyril Mast used whisky, and he had not let himself slip down even in a climate where all occupations are a burden. If you talked to him, he was pleasant enough, and you found him rather exceptionally well-informed; but you had to begin the talking. He was melancholy by nature, but he had realised it and did his best to keep his melancholy to himself. The work of the secretaryship was a godsend to him.

Sir John had never before sought the society of the Rev. Cyril Mast, but now he meant to keep in touch with him. It was not only because, if it should happen that there was a violent and desperate thing to be done, he felt that he could make Mast do it. Sir John appreciated keenly the trappings of civilisation; he wished things to be done decently and in order. He could not make the Exiles’ Club in Faloo quite like the London clubs of which he had ceased ipso facto to be a member, but he worked in that direction. He respected—almost in excess of its merits—the Baringstoke family, but when Lord Charles Baringstoke entered the public rooms of the club in pyjamas and a dressing-gown, Sir John resented it. Public opinion in Faloo was not strong enough to stop drunkenness, but there were limits, and the limits had of late too frequently been exceeded. There had been noise and brawling, and worse. Mast had been a bad offender; his conversation with some of the members was one stream of witless and senseless filth, and in his hours of intoxication he had been beyond measure bestial and disgusting. Yet it had been said that Mast had his moments, and he had shown some ability, though with little judgment to direct it. Sir John began to think that association might effect something, for Mast like most weak men took his colour largely from his company. He did not dream of reforming Mast, for the man was congenitally vicious; but he thought he might effect a temporary break in the dreary see-saw of swinishness and sentimentalism that made up the man’s life, and this would help to stop the growing disorder in the club.

So he complimented Mast on his speech, and Mast, like any spaniel, was delighted with a little attention from the man who had chastised him.

“I’ve something else I want you to do. I’m sending a couple of servants to pack up all Bassett’s effects. You might superintend that—see that there’s no pilfering and that everything is properly sealed up. And, by the way, I’ve ordered a grilled chicken at nine to-night, and reserved our last bottle of Chambertin. I should be glad if you’d join me. I daresay Pryce will come in later.”

Mast accepted these proposals with alacrity. He was conscious of some faint glow of self-respect—or of vanity, which so often serves the same purpose.

Late in the afternoon Sir John received a note from Dr Pryce, brought by a messenger. It contained little more than a request that his clothes might be sent him, and the statement that he would write on the morrow if he could find time.

Over the grilled chicken that night Sir John was rather absent-minded. He did not seem in the least inclined to say anything further about Mast’s excellent speech, although he had the opportunity.

“And when do you expect Dr Pryce?” Mast asked.

“Not to-night after all. I’ve heard from him, of course. The poor girl’s really ill. But still we must hope for the best. Pryce has wonderful skill and experience. Shall we—er—join them in the card-room?”

In one corner of the card-room Hanson, the new secretary, was giving Lord Charles Baringstoke a game of chess. There was nobody in the club whose play gave Hanson more trouble. Hanson played like a scholar; his opponent played like a demoniac with occasional flashes of inspiration and was generally, but not invariably, beaten. To-night, for instance, he looked up triumphantly from the board.

“Well, old cockie?”

“Yes,” said Hanson, “that is so. I’d given you credit for something better, and when you unmasked, my position was hopeless. Serves me right. Quite interesting though.”

“Tell you what. My game’s improving?”

“No, Charles,” said Hanson, “it’s clever but unprincipled, and always will be. Still, it’s always suggestive. Now let me see if I can’t wake up a little.”

“I say,” said Sir John bitterly from the card-table where he was playing a difficult hand, “is chess a game that requires so much conversation?”

“Sorry,” said Hanson.

“We’ve made papa quite cross,” said Lord Charles Baringstoke as he arranged the pieces. He was not allowed to win again that night.

Mast played very sober bridge with very bad luck. He could not hold a card.

“I’m a perfect Jonah to-night,” he said after his third rubber, as he paid his loss.

“Yes,” said Sir John, genially, as he gathered the money, “we shall have to throw you overboard. Come along now. We were very late last night. Bed’s not a bad idea.”

The Rev. Cyril Mast followed him meekly.

The King drove furiously, but Dr Pryce was not a nervous man. When they arrived at the King’s house, Lechworthy was pacing the verandah anxiously, awaiting them. Dr Pryce was presented to him, but very little was said, for the doctor wished to see his patient at once, and went off to her room.

Nearly an hour had passed before he reappeared on the verandah.

“Well, doctor,” said Mr Lechworthy, eagerly. “I have been much alarmed—needlessly, I hope. What is the matter with my niece?”

“I don’t know the name of it,” said Dr Pryce. “I’ve seen it several times here—never in Europe.”

“She is seriously ill?”

“Undoubtedly. But Miss Auriol has a fine constitution, and if we can fight through the next thirty-six hours, recovery is likely to be very rapid. Unfortunately, those two native girls, with the best intentions, have been playing about with native remedies.”

“And they are useless?”

“They are very much worse than that. However, it won’t happen again, and now that I have talked to them, Tiva and Ioia may be quite handy.” At the moment Tiva and Ioia were frightened out of their lives, weeping tears of bitterest penitence, and wishing they were dead.

“Yes,” said Lechworthy, “you will be able to use them as nurses.”

“A nurse who can’t take a temperature isn’t much use to me at present. I shall be nurse and doctor too. But they can do little things under my direction—fetch and carry and so on—and they’re willing enough.”

“I feel a terrible responsibility in having brought Miss Auriol here. I had hoped, doctor, that you would be able to give me better news.”

“Perhaps, that will come to-morrow. Meanwhile, there are things I must see to. Is Smith still here?”

For the moment Lechworthy did not understand that it was of the King that Pryce spoke in this unceremonious way. “The King?” he said. “Yes, he wished to see you.”

“Thanks. I’ll go and find him.” He paused a moment. There was something in the plucky, self-controlled wretchedness of the old man that appealed to him. “There is no immediate danger,” he said. “If there were, I would tell you. I am going to remain here, and in one point I want to prepare you. Miss Auriol is ill now, but she will be worse this evening. I expect a further rise in temperature, and there may be delirium, and in consequence some noise. But you must not let that upset you too much—it’s foreseen and I shall be ready to deal with it. If she gets a good sleep afterwards, I shall be quite satisfied.”

“Thank you very much for telling me. Indeed—I wish I could thank you better for all you’re doing for us. It is good of you to have come and to devote so much time to us. I feel it—far more than I can express at present.”

“My time here is of little value. You understand then—I cannot say that Miss Auriol is out of danger, but there’s room for hope. I’ll do my best, Mr Lechworthy. Go and see her for a few minutes now, if you like. After that, I would rather she were left alone, unless she asks specially for you and begins worrying.”

Mr Lechworthy was almost aggressively cheerful during the few minutes that he spent with his niece. Her room was pleasantly cool, and so darkened that he could only just make out the pale face and the mass of hair on the pillow. Mr Lechworthy expressed the opinion that Pryce seemed to be an able doctor and would put her right in no time.

“And how do you get on with him, my dear?”

“I think,” said Hilda, faintly, “that he is the very gentlest man I ever met.”

“Good,” said Mr Lechworthy. “You like him then. That’s right.”

Hilda’s estimate of Dr Pryce would probably have excited some mirth among his friends at the Exiles’ Club. Lechworthy, as he resumed his notes on South Sea Missions, found himself puzzled by Dr Pryce. Somehow or other Lechworthy had expected to see a furtive, very polite, shaky little man, one who would try to ingratiate himself—something like Mast or Bassett. He found that he could not fit Dr Pryce into any reasonable idea of the fugitive from justice.

Meanwhile Pryce had found the King asleep in a long chair in the garden. The King had spent less than one hour in bed, and at such times he slept when he got the chance. But he was awake and alert almost as soon as he heard Pryce’s voice.

“And what is this illness?” he asked immediately.

“The same that you had—and your boss man on the plantations.”

“Good,” said the King. “Then you must cure her.”

“You, like your plantation boss, are a man and a native; Miss Auriol is a woman and a European. I got on to your case at once; here, before I arrived, Miss Auriol had been made to swallow a mess of boiled leaves—of a kind that might have poisoned a woman in good health. She has the disease in a worse form than you had it. I could give you horse-medicine; I should kill Miss Auriol if I gave the same doses to her. Well, I don’t expect you to understand. But you can understand this—on the whole, the probability is that Miss Auriol will die.”

“You stop here?”

“Of course.”

“My servants, my house, myself—all are at your disposal. I am no more King here: here the doctor is King. All that you say will be done. But Miss Auriol must not die. I have given my word that you can save her and that you will save her.”

“Then you’re a fool,” said Dr Pryce, bluntly.

“Why? I was ill—it was the same thing. You saved me—so you save her too. She must not die. It means too many things. If she dies, other people will die. You will die, Dr Pryce.”

“Shall I?” said Pryce, smiling. He took his revolver from the case at his belt, held it by the barrel, and handed it to Smith. “Catch hold of that, will you? Thanks. Now then, you can either put a bullet through my head or you can take your words back. You shall do one or the other. Refuse and I leave you to do the doctoring.”

The King examined the revolver, and handed it back again.

“I apologise,” said the King. “But I have not slept much, and so I judge badly. You must excuse me. Perhaps I wished, too, to make a test. You will take no notice. It is—”

“I’m in a hurry,” said Pryce. “I want fresh milk for my patient. I’d like cow’s milk, but that can’t be got. Goats?”

“Yes,” said the King. “I had yesterday to decide the possession of a goat. It was a goat in milk, valuable because the milk could be sold to the Exiles’ Club. Shall I have some milk sent up?”

“How far away is the goat?”

“About a mile.”

“Then have the goat driven here, and driven very gently. I’d like to vet the beast first. If she’s healthy, then with a little modification the milk will do. Have you an ice-machine here?”

“Yes.”

“I shall want a good deal of ice to-night probably.”

“I will see to that. Is there anything else?”

“I may want some brandy later, and if so I want the best I can get. You used to have some—”

“Of the genuine old cognac that the French padre gave me. There is still one bottle left. It is at my office. I will send a messenger for it.”

“Right. See about the goat first, please.” Dr Pryce turned back to the house.

There he found the tear-stained Tiva waiting for him. In her hand she held a plant with small yellowish-white flowers. Dr Pryce had sent her to get it.

“See,” she said eagerly. “All right?”

“Yes, that’s all right,” said Dr Pryce, taking the plant. “You’re a good girl, though a fool in some respects. You can go back to Ioia now. And, remember, you do not enter Miss Auriol’s room, unless she rings that little bell by her bedside.”

In addition to doing much of the work that usually falls to the nurse, Dr Pryce had also to be his own manufacturing chemist. Two cases of drugs and apparatus, that he had brought with him, had been placed in a room near Hilda’s. Dr Pryce unpacked what he wanted. There was oxygen to be made and stored, and the dangerous virtue of those yellowish-white flowers to be extracted.

The King was kept very busy on the beach that afternoon and evening. His schooner had come in, and brought stores of all kinds, some for the Exiles’ Club and some for the King himself. There was a bag of letters, and there was money for Lord Charles Baringstoke. Two messengers had come down from the palace by his direction, but they had brought little news; the case was going on much as had been expected—that was all Dr Pryce would say. At ten o’clock, as no messenger had come for the last four hours, the King mounted his horse and rode up to the palace.

“I’m glad you’ve come, sir,” said Mr Lechworthy. “Indeed, I was on the point of sending for you.”

“Miss Auriol is better?”

“I—I don’t know. At sunset it was terrible—one heard her moaning and screaming. Dr Pryce had told me it would be so, but still it was terrible. For the last two hours he has been in her room and everything has been quite quiet.”

“He dined with you, I suppose.”

“No. He came in for a minute, and took a cup of coffee. That was all. I can’t tell you the things that that man has done to-day. He has done everything—even to the preparing of such food as she has been allowed to take. If she recovers, it is to Dr Pryce, under Providence, that she owes her life.”

“But why does he remain so long? Why does he not come and tell us?”

“I don’t know. I hope, of course, that she is asleep.”

“If she is asleep, then all is well, and he need not remain.”

“Yes,” admitted Mr Lechworthy. “But I have very great confidence in that doctor. We had better not interfere.”

“Here he comes,” said the King.

“I heard nothing.”

“A door opened and shut softly.”

Dr Soames Pryce came out on to the verandah where Lechworthy and the King were seated. His coat and waistcoat were off. With his left hand he rubbed his right forearm. His smile was slightly triumphant.

“Well, we’ve got through all right, Mr Lechworthy. Had a bit of a fight for it too. Miss Auriol has been asleep for nearly two hours and is still asleep.”

“Then why have you left us without news?” asked the King.

“This another of your little tests?” sneered Pryce.

“Do you want me to apologise again for that? I will if you like. I was a fool, and I know it now. I asked that only because I did not understand. I did not think it would annoy you.”

Mr Lechworthy looked from one man to the other. He did not understand to what they referred.

“All right, old chap,” said Pryce. “I couldn’t come before because Miss Auriol had hold of my right hand when she went to sleep, and I didn’t want to wake her again. Simple enough, isn’t it?”

“I’m afraid she’s given you a cramp in your right arm,” said Lechworthy.

“It wouldn’t prevent me from holding a knife and fork,” said the doctor.

“That’s good,” said the King. “We will have supper together.” In another second he would have clapped his hands.

“No noise,” said Pryce, quickly.

“Right. I will go and fetch servants myself.”

Lechworthy also rose and went through the French windows. Dr Pryce stretched himself at full length in a chair and closed his eyes. He was rather more worn out than he would have admitted.

He opened his eyes again as Lechworthy came back on to the verandah with a glass in his hand. “I’ve ventured,” said Mr Lechworthy. “Supper won’t be ready for a few minutes. Whisky-and-soda, eh?”

“Good idea,” said Pryce, taking the glass. “All the same, I don’t want you to run about waiting on me.”

“But my dear doctor, I can’t even begin to—”

“Miss Auriol’s a prize patient,” interrupted Dr Pryce. “Good constitution, good pluck, good intelligence. By the way—”

King Smith came out to tell them that supper was ready.