Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction. Vol. 27, No. 2, September 24, 1927

Dr. Hailey moved across the room to the fireplace. He signed to Ninon to join him.

“When did she come here this afternoon?” he asked, low tones.

“A little while before you came.”

“To get you to give her another dose?”

“Yes, and to gaze also into my crystal. Yesterday, I have shown her—”

Ninon moved her hands in a semicircle.

“That means that she is still on the rack of anxiety.”

He stood with vacant eyes gazing at the wall in front of him. Ninon knelt down and spread out her hands to the fire. Then she took the tongs and put some pieces of coal on the fire.

“Lord Templewood,” Dr. Hailey said, “used a very strange expression when I told him that you were giving drugs to his niece.”

He glanced down at Ninon as he spoke. She was in the act of transferring a piece of coal from the box to the fire. The course of the tongs was immediately arrested.

“Yes?”

“He said: ‘That, too—’ and then he added: ‘Like father, like son.’ I think in reference to Barrington Bryan, though I was not able at the time to see the connect—”

The tongs fell with a crash on to the fender.

At the same moment, while Ninon crouched at the doctor’s feet, like a wild creature stricken to death, Sacha sprang from the couch.

“Dick, Dick,” she cried, “what has happened? Oh, Dick, what has happened?”

She came unsteadily to the small table on which the crystal was standing. She caught at the edge of the table. Then she moved round the table until she reached a point from which the fireplace was visible.

“Oh, Dick, he isn’t — Dick, he doesn’t move; he’s not moving, Dick! Dick, he’s not moving!”

Sacha’s voice fell to a whisper.

“Is he breathing? Dick, I’ll get a looking-glass from my room to see if he’s breathing. Oh, why doesn’t he move? And his face is so pale, too. His face is terribly pale, Dick. I’m sure there must be something wrong.”

She caught her breath in a gasp. Her unseeing eyes were wide with horror.

“Perhaps he’s fainted. Shall I get some water? Shall I get some water, Dick?”

Dr. Hailey put out his hands and took Sacha’s hands.

“He’s all right,” he said, in firm tones, “don’t be frightened about him.”

“He isn’t all right, Dick—”

She withdrew her hands suddenly.

“Oh, dear, we must do something. We must do something. He mustn’t be found here like this. Dick, if he is found here—”

The doctor put his arm about her shoulders. He led her back to the couch, and this time she made no attempt to escape from him. When she had dosed her eyes again, he saw that the weal on her brow had begun to fade. That on her forearm was already a mere thread of pink. He turned to Ninon, who had risen and was standing with one elbow on the mantelpiece.

“Can nothing be done to wake her?”

The girl shook her head. He saw that she had begun to tremble again. Her lips were blue, as though she chilled for a fever.

“She has hypnotized herself with the crystal. She must sleep till she wakes of herself.”

Dr. Hailey returned to the fireplace.

“I think,” he said, “that it was your dropping of the tongs into the fender which roused her. I have reason to believe that Orme Malone’s head struck the fender in the great hall when he fell.”

He broke off. Ninon was sobbing again, as she had sobbed before in the waiting room. Her nerves seemed to be utterly unstrung.

“Will you not sit down? It may be some time yet before she awakes.”

The girl sank into a chair. She rested her brow on her arm, showing him the admirable curve of her neck, with its close-cropped black hair. She was still shivering. He crossed the room to the door, which they had left standing ajar, and closed it.

“What was that?”

Sacha moved uneasily, as she spoke. She raised herself on her elbow.

“What was that, Dick?” She looked up to the ceiling of the room, appearing to challenge an invisible danger. “Didn’t you hear a door? There must be some one. Oh, Dick, if anybody should be watching!”

She sank down again. Dr. Hailey came to her and drew a chair up to the side of the couch. He seated himself, and took one of her hands in his hands.

“You will wake up soon, now,” he said in gentle tones.

He laid his hand on Sacha’s brow, and pressed his fingers lightly on her eyeballs. He repeated his words over and over again, always in the same tones. The girl, however, did not respond to his attempts at counter-hypnosis.