He had a soft, rather quick way of speaking; to-day he was huskier than usual, perhaps because he was ill. He was long and slim; he had used, in pre-war days, to lounge and slouch, but possibly did that no more. Anyhow to-day he merely lay limply in a chair, so they could not judge. His long pale face and flexible mouth and dark eyebrows were always moving and changing; so were his rather bright eyes, that kept shading and glinting from green to hazel. His forehead and rumpled hair were damp just now, either from the heat or from some other cause. His bandaged right hand was raised in a sling. 'You do look an old wreck,' said Nonie frankly. 'What did you go and do it for? A silly way of getting wounded, I call it, playing ball with bombs.' 'Rotten, wasn't it? But it would have played ball with me if I hadn't. It was bound to go off in a moment, you see, and I naturally tried to house it with the foe first; one often can. My mistake, I know. These little things will happen.... I say, you're the first people I've seen from the shop. How's it going? Who are the good people this year?' They began to tell him. He listened, fidgeting, with restless eyes. 'Have a smoke?' he broke in. 'No, I suppose you mustn't here. Sorry; didn't mean to interrupt....' They were talking about the exhibition in Grafton Street. 'I must get round there,' he said, 'when I'm not so tied by the leg.' 'How long will they keep you here, d'you imagine?' 'Haven't an earthly. They may be depriving me of a finger or two in a few days. Or not. They don't seem to know their own minds about it.' 'Good Lord!' murmured Nonie, taken aback. 'I say, don't let them. You--you'd miss them so.' 'Halli, hallo, halli, hallo! Bei uns geht's immer so!' shrilled number eight. Doye moved impatiently. 'He ought to be taken away, poor beggar.... I loathe hospitals. People who are ill oughtn't to be with other people in the same miserable condition; it's too depressing. One wants the undamaged, as an antidote. That's why visitors are so jolly.' His restless eyes glanced at Nonie's dark, glowing brilliance in her yellow frock, and at Alix, pale and cool and thin in green. 'Above all,' he added, 'one wants sanity and normalness and cheeriness, not people with their nerves in rags, like that poor chap.' Eight broke out again, half singing, half humming some students' chorus-- 'Tra la la, in die Nacht Quartier!' The auburn-haired nurse came and stood by him for a moment, quieting him. 'Come now, come now, you must be quiet, you know.' 'Rather a pleasant person, that nurse,' said Doye when she had gone. 'Jolly hair, hasn't she?... Alix,' he added, 'do you know, you don't look up to much. Is it overwork, or merely the air of London in June?' 'It's the air of hospitals, I expect,' Nonie answered for her. 'She turned white directly we got into the ward.' 'Beastly places,' Basil agreed.