"I'm sorry old man. I must have interrupted one of your immense calculations." Tietjens said: "You haven't. I was only thinking. I'm just as glad you've come. What did you say?" Macmaster repeated: "I said the General is in a terrible temper. It's just as well you didn't come up to dinner." Tietjens said: "He isn't . . . He isn't in a temper. He's as pleased as punch at not having to have these women up before him." Macmaster said: "He says he's got the police scouring the whole county for them, and that you'd better leave by the first train to-morrow." Tietjens said: "I won't. I can't. I've got to wait here for a wire from Sylvia." Macmaster groaned: "Oh dear! Oh dear!" Then he said hopefully: "But we could have it forwarded to Hythe." Tietjens said with some vehemence: "I tell you I won't leave here. I tell you I've settled it with the police and that swine of a Cabinet Minister. I've mended the leg of the canary of the wife of the police-constable. Sit down and be reasonable. The police don't touch people like us." Macmaster said: "I don't believe you realise the public feeling there is . . ." "Of course I do, amongst people like Sandbach," Tietjens said. "Sit down I tell you. . . . Have some whisky. . . ." He filled himself out another long tumbler and, holding it, dropped into a too low-seated, reddish wicker arm-chair that had cretonne fixings. Beneath his weight the chair sagged a good deal and his dress-shirt front bulged up to his chin. Macmaster said: "What's the matter with you?" Tietjens' eyes were bloodshot. "I tell you," Tietjens said, "I'm waiting for a wire from Sylvia." Macmaster said: "Oh!" And then: "It can't come to-night, it's getting on for one." "It can," Tietjens said, "I've fixed it up with the postmaster--all the way up to Town! It probably won't come because Sylvia won't send it until the last moment, to bother me. None the less I'm waiting for a wire from Sylvia, and this is what I look like." Macmaster said: "That woman's the cruellest beast . . ." "You might," Tietjens interrupted, "remember that you're talking about my wife." "I don't see," Macmaster said, "how one can talk about Sylvia without . . ." "The line is a perfectly simple one to draw," Tietjens said. "You can relate a lady's actions if you know them and are asked to. You mustn't comment. In this case you don't know the lady's actions even, so you may as well hold your tongue." He sat looking straight in front of him. Macmaster sighed from deep in his chest. He asked himself if this was what sixteen hours waiting had done for his friend, what were all the remaining hours going to do? Tietjens said: "I shall be fit to talk about Sylvia after two more whiskies. . . . Let's settle your other perturbations first. . . . The fair girl is called Wannop: Valentine Wannop." "That's the Professor's name," Macmaster said. "She's the late Professor Wannop's daughter," Tietjens said. "She's also the daughter of the novelist."