"I say!" Dolph looked up suddenly. "I've a patch to put over that hole. About three weeks ago? Yes? Well, at Olive Keltridge's last dinner, Prather came edging up to me. I saw he had things on his mind, and I wasn't busy, so I let him get them off. Else, I was afraid he'd strangle with the unaccustomed load." "And the things were me?" Reed inquired urbanely. "Yes. He asked me if I had heard that you were growing very nervous lately. That you--Well, never mind the rest of it. In the time of it, though, I supposed that it was his novelist's imagination that had got to work. Now I know it was only another manifestation of the almighty Ramsdell." "He is almighty, Dolph. I'd be badly off without him." "So I observe." Dolph chuckled. "At first, I was as afraid of him as if he had been a country undertaker looking for a job; but I'm slowly coming to the belief that the fellow is an actual wag. Really, you'd be badly off without him. He'll stay on, of course?" "As long as I can keep him. He informs me daily that he'll see me through it till I die. From all indications, though, I'm a good deal more afraid of his dying, first." "Rot!" Dolph remarked cheerily. "What you need, Opdyke, is to forego thoughts of dying, and get busy." "What about?" Reed asked a little bitterly. "My present environment isn't particularly fitted for the strenuous life." Dolph shut his two hands, side by side, around his ankle. When he spoke, though, his voice was unconcerned. "Not unless you take your profession into bed with you," he remarked. From behind Opdyke's courteous smile for a rather dull joke, there gathered interest, comprehension, eagerness. "Dennison, you mean something or other, out of that," he said, after a little pause. Dolph shot him one swift glance of scrutiny. "Naturally. As a rule, I don't talk at random," he said then. "What do you mean, exactly?" Reed sought to put the question steadily, but his voice throbbed with excitement. Satisfied with the start that he had made, Dolph let go his ankle and sank back inertly in his chair. "What idiots you specialist fellows are!" he observed indolently. "Once you get smacked on the head, you're all in. You think you are killed, and, instead of kicking around to find out the truth of the matter, you promptly proceed to turn up your toes." Reed eyed him keenly, spoke impatiently. "Interpret, Dolph. I may be dense; but I can't see what it is you're driving at." "More fool you! I thought better of you, Opdyke, than all that," Dolph told him, with unabated serenity. "Didn't you ever hear of such a thing as a consulting engineer?" "I ought, as it was my official title," Reed made curt answer. "What then?" "Put your title into commission, man." "Impossible."