I lay in the warm bed and for a long time I tried to think of something that I knew I should recall, and at last, after hours of waking and dozing and waking again, I had it; it was the fact that I was not dead. When I knew this for certain I was extremely surprised, in the weak fashion of the very ill. I slept once more, and when I woke again I was stronger and more in command of my mind. I was still a little astonished that I was alive. Then I began to wonder whether I was blind. The knowledge that I would not know about this for some days was intolerable. I yelled angrily, and a cool hand was laid across my lips. "Gently, Will, gently," said the loveliest voice in England. Then I knew that I could bear the uncertainty till doomsday, if I must. "Hello, Marion," I said, brushing the hand with my dry lips. "What time is it?" "Middle of the afternoon, Will. You've been asleep a long while. It's Tuesday." "Tuesday. Good Lord, nearly forty-eight hours!" "Do your eyes hurt?" "Not much." "Thank John for that." "Where is he?" "Here," said the physician's voice. "We're all here but the Colonel." "He's in London," said Marion Black, "buying supplies." "Is Johnson here?" "Yes, sir," said the respectful voice of the pale-faced old man. "Very much at sea, if you'll allow me, Mister Chester." "They haven't told you, Johnson?" I asked incredulously. "You must think us all mad!" "No, sir," said he promptly, "I give you my word I don't, sir. Had it been one or two of you, why then I might fancy you'd gone off your respective rockers, as you might say, sir; but six of you--that's different." "What do you think, then, Johnson?" "I think there's something big going on, sir," said the old man. "Something fearfully big. With poor young Mister Exeter blind, and you a-lying here like this--what _is_ it, sir? They told me you were the proper one to explain." "Johnson," I said, grinning, "that's the first time I ever heard your voice express anything but well-bred deference." * * * * * Johnson coughed and, I imagine, looked at the floor with embarrassment. "Very strange circumstances, sir," he said. "I shan't keep you in suspense, Johnson, although these callous people have. Are you prepared to hear a nightmare of a yarn?" "Are you prepared to tell it?" growled John Baringer. "Oh, yes. I seem to have had a good bit of rest lately." I drank from a glass that Marion put to my mouth, and said, "You remember Jerry Wolfe?" "Of course, sir." "You were there the day he came back to the Gloucester Club and was murdered, weren't you?" I knew he had been, but I was feeling my way into the story. "Yes, sir. I brought him and Mister Talbot here a bottle of Scotch. I saw him killed."