CHAPTER NINE I MIDWAY through that April afternoon at the End House I thought: I shall feel like continuing the novel to-night.... I didn't do so, as a matter of fact, because I was too sleepy; but the desire was there, reawakened by the extraordinary way in which events were developing. Helen was out when I called, but Severn himself, reading in his invalid-chair, was delighted to see me. I think he was still more delighted when I recounted to him the full details of my interview with June. His eyes quickened with excitement, and when I had finished he said: "Well, Hilton, it all sounds most decidedly queer, but let's join in thanking Heaven that _something_ has happened. If you only knew how bored I am in this chair all day, you'd understand my deep gratitude to Karelsky." "To _him_?" "Yes. For doing something interesting at last. When I read his stuff in the papers last night, I said to myself--'Ah, the usual thing--some discovery that will either be discredited within a fortnight or superseded within a year....' But it _isn't_ the usual thing, if he's stolen his ideas from Terry.... By Jove, it's going to be interesting--damned interesting." He asked me to get him a box of Havanas from a cabinet nearby, and when I brought it to him I saw that his eyes were filling with tears. "_Interesting_!" he repeated, offering me the box and lighting a cigar for himself. "D'you know--I've wondered some times if I should ever have to use that word again? But _this_ news--well, it deserves it. And it's jolly good of you to use up your valuable time in coming to tell me about it." "It's more than interesting," I said. "It's serious. And it's going to be made serious, too--for Karelsky." He laughed then. "What are you going to do--murder him?" "It will probably be sufficient to bring an action against him." "What for?" I said that I wasn't a legal authority, but that it seemed to me that Terry would have a good case if he took the matter to court. "As a matter of fact," I added, "I rather wanted your advice about it." "My advice is never to expect to win an action because you've got a good case." "No?" "The case doesn't matter. It's the lawyer that counts. That's my experience, as a man who's won hundreds of bad cases and made other people lose hundreds of good ones." "It sounds rather terrible."