He sighed profoundly as he slipped his pipe into his pocket. By this time he was lucidly himself. The decision to enlarge his premises, and all that meant, would not be weakened, but strengthened, by a night’s sleep. Sleep! He smiled derisively. Sleep! Everybody in Melchester was asleep. He beheld himself and Susan growing fat in this sleepy town. Susan was already plumper. She would develop into just such a fleshly tabernacle as her mother. He exclaimed loudly and virulently: "Damn!" This was his acknowledgment of defeat. His "Vae victis." He writhed impotently in the toils of circumstance, although the struggle was over. The night seemed to have turned darker, the stars paled in the violet sky, as he walked slowly towards the Dream Cottage, wherein his wonderful dream would never come true. One would like to record that thoughts of his pretty, loving wife, and thoughts of his Posy—admittedly the gem of gems—stirred within him, pouring spikenard upon his lacerated sensibilities. It was not so. They stood for poppy, and mandragora, or, as he might have put it, old port and brown sherry in cut-glass decanters. And every fibre of his small, sturdy body clamoured for a fight in the London ring, a fight to a finish with the experts of his trade. At that dark moment he beheld light. *IV* The light came from Dream Cottage—a faint luminous glow, so strange, so mysterious, that he stood still, straining his eyes to determine the meaning of it till that meaning flared full upon him. One of the chimneys was ablaze! Instantly his dormant energies awoke to liveliest activity. He raced back to a corner of the Close, where he had passed a policeman. The man had wandered farther on his beat. He overtook him, gasping. "My house is afire!" The policeman recognized Quinney, and nodded owlishly. "Your house afire?" he repeated. "You bolt for the engine—see?" He twirled round the massive figure, and pushed it vigorously. The guardian of the night broke into a slow trot. Quinney shouted: "Get a move on!" and sped back to the cottage. The light was no longer faintly luminous. Flames—hungry tongues of destruction—were licking the darkness. *CHAPTER IX* *SALVAGE* *I* Quinney found Susan asleep. In the small dressing room next to their bedroom, Posy also slumbered sweetly, although acrid smoke was filling the house. When Susan understood that she was not the victim of some hideous nightmare, Quinney imposed his commands. "You’ve time to slip on warm clothes. Bolt on to the lawn with Posy. Don’t try to save any of your rags. I’ll wake Maria—and then I’ve a lot to do. The best stuff downstairs is not insured. The engine will be here in two jiffs. You scoot out o’ this! Hear me?"