Yes!--the breath of the man was coming more regularly, and his pulse felt slower and steadier. In a moment it would be safe to leave him and look for help. He withdrew his hand from the wrist it held and touched the sleeper's forehead. It was scarcely so hot as he had expected it to be. But it seemed insensitive to his touch, as there was no perceptible shrinking from it. The patient could be safely left for a moment. He rose to his feet and stretched himself, glad of the respite. In the account of the affair that he wrote later to his substitute at Royd, he lays claim to having had no feeling at this moment but a wish for clean warm water to wash the touch of the drunkard's wrists off. He watched the motionless figure on the couch for a few moments, and the breathing satisfied him. He could be spared; for as short a time as need be, though. He opened the door quietly and went out. But he returned to lock it; removing the key from within, but leaving it in the lock. Then he opened the street door and looked out. The little one had evidently misunderstood his instruction to leave it open--well! she really was almost a baby. However, that was enough to account for the non-appearance of any policeman. No police-officer ever leaves a "stood open" door uninvestigated in the small hours of the morning. CHAPTER XIV OF THE END OF THE BLIZZARD, AND OF SIMON MAGUS. HOW MR. TAYLOR FOUND A DOCTOR. OF A CHASE THROUGH THE SNOW, AND A CANAL-LOCK. WHAT WAS FOUND IN IT. BUT SIMON WAS INVISIBLE How sweet and white and silent was the huge shroud of snow that lay so carefully on road and roof alike; unbroken, in this untrodden stillness, by so much as the memory of a rut inherited from yesterday's traffic; unmelted, even on the chimney-stacks, by the expiring efforts of yesterday's fires! How satisfied the stars that began to twinkle through the clearing veil of the snowdrift dying down, that the work of hiding London from them had been done thoroughly and well, and that they might shine on something clean at last! For the blizzard had gone to an appointment elsewhere, and the few flakes of belated snow that were afloat had given up all thought of blinding human eyes, and only seemed to pause in their selection of a resting-place. They had an _embarras de choix_. As the sole spectator of the stillness stood looking out into the night, and thinking Wordsworth to himself, he saw the fixed red eye of a Cyclops railway-signal through the clear air; snow-scoured, and innocent, so far, of smoke. All that mighty heart was lying still--yes! But that engine, idling on the line and wide awake, felt free to wander to and fro, with clanks, and finally to execute an _arpeggio_ of truncated snorts downwards, and give a sudden yell, and depart behind a steam-blast from beneath its apron. Then Mr. Taylor saw distinctly, at the end of his wrong turning, the fence that stultified it as a thoroughfare.