"I'll confer with Colonel Byrne," answered Plume guardedly. And Byrne was waiting for them, a tall, dark shadow in the black depths of the piazza. Graham would have edged away and gone to his own den, but Plume held to him. There was something he needed to say, yet could not until the agent had retired. Daly saw,--perhaps he had already imbibed something of the situation,--and was not slow to seek his room. Plume took the little kerosene lamp; hospitably led the way; made the customary tender of a "night-cap," and polite regrets he had no ice to offer therewith; left his unwonted guest with courteous good-night and cast an eye aloft as he came through the hall. All there was dark and still, though he doubted much that Graham's sedatives had yet prevailed. He had left the two men opposite the doorway. He found them at the south end of the piazza, their heads together. They straightened up to perfunctory talk about the Medical Director, his drastic methods and inflammable ways; but the mirth was forced, the humor far too dry. Then silence fell. Then Plume invaded it: "How'd you find Wren--mentally?" he presently asked. He felt that an opening of some kind was necessary. "Sound," was the colonel's answer, slow and sententious. "Of course he is much--concerned." "About--his case? Ah, will you smoke, colonel?" "About Blakely. I believe not, Plume; it's late." Plume struck a light on the sole of his natty boot. "One would suppose he would feel very natural anxiety as to the predicament in which he has placed himself," he ventured. "Wren worries much over Blakely's injuries, which accident made far more serious than he would have inflicted, major, even had he had the grounds for violence that he thought he had. Blakely was not the only sufferer, and is not the only cause, of his deep contrition. Wren tells me that he was even harsher to Angela. But that is all a family matter." The colonel was speaking slowly, thoughtfully. "But--these later affairs--that Wren couldn't explain--or wouldn't." Plume's voice and color both were rising. "Couldn't is the just word, major, and couldn't especially--to you," was the significant reply. Plume rose from his chair and stood a moment, trembling not a little and his fingers twitching. "You mean--" he huskily began. "I mean this, my friend," said Byrne gently, as he, too, arose, "and I have asked Graham, another friend, to be here--that Wren would not defend himself to you by even mentioning--others, and might not have revealed the truth even to me had he been the only one cognizant of it. But, Plume, _others_ saw what he saw, and what is now known to many people on the post. Others than Wren were abroad that night. One other was being carefully, tenderly brought home--_led_ home--to your roof. You did not know--Mrs. Plume was a somnambulist?"