“Why don’t you tell me?” The comic aspects were becoming apparent: Stokharin’s assaulted dignity and the ruin of Clarissa’s ingenious hair both seemed to me suddenly funny; I cleared my throat to obscure the tickling of a smile. Paul named some stupendous figures with an air of triumph. “And there are more coming all the time. Think of that!” “Are they favorable?” “Favorable? Who cares?” Paul was pacing the floor quickly, keyed to the breaking-point had he possessed the metabolism of a normal man. “We’ll have a breakdown over the weekend. Hired more people already. Whole lot working all the time. By the way, we’re moving.” “Not a moment too soon,” said Clarissa balefully. “I suggest, in fact, we move now while there are even these few police to protect us. When they go home for lunch (they all eat enormous lunches, one can tell), that crowd is going to come in here and throw us out the window.” “Or suffocate us with love,” said Paul. Stokharin looked at Clarissa thoughtfully; with his turned-around necktie he had a sacerdotal look. “Do you often think of falling from high places? of being pushed from windows or perhaps high trees?” “Only when I’m on the top floor of the world’s highest building surrounded by raving maniacs do such forebodings occur to me, doctor. Had you a greater sense of reality you might be experiencing the same apprehension.” Stokharin clapped his hands happily. “Classic, classic. To believe she alone knows reality. Madam, I suggest that you....” There was a roar of sound from the hallway; a noise of glass shattering; a revolver went off with a sharp report and, frozen with alarm, I waited for its echo: there was none; only shouts of: Cave! Cave! Cave! Surrounded by police, Cave and Iris were escorted into the office. More police held the door, aided by the office crew who, suddenly inspired, were throwing paper cups full of water into the crowd. Flash bulbs like an electric storm flared in all directions as the newspaper men invaded the office, let in by the police who could not hold them back. Iris looked frightened and even Cave seemed alarmed by the rioting. Once the police lieutenant had got Cave and Iris into the office, he sent his men back to hold the corridor. Before he joined them he said sternly, breathing hard from the struggle, “We’re going to clear the hall in the next hour. When we do we’ll come and get you people out of here. You got to leave whether you want to or not. This is an emergency.” “An hour is all we need, officer.” Paul was smooth. “And may I tell you that my old friend, the Commissioner, is going to hear some extremely nice things about the efficiency and good sense of his men.” Before the lieutenant had got around to framing a suitably warm answer, Paul had maneuvered him out of the inner office; he locked the door behind him. “There,” he said, turning to us, very businesslike. “It was a mistake meeting here after last night. I’m sorry, John.”