Lying there, hour after hour, in the uncanny silence of that room, the conviction had grown until now it enfolded him like the arms of a woman, that the sleep upon which he was about to enter would be his last. This brief but intense review of experience had pierced him so deeply that it began to seem certain that the end was now near. At last, he fell into a doze. But hardly had consciousness left him, when, with a violent start, he awoke. Somebody had entered the room. The electric light next the door had been switched on. He sat up in bed to confront a face drawn and haggard, and a pair of eyes somber, ruthless, terrible. They were the eyes of John Endor. XXVI For a space of ten seconds or so, the two men stared at one another. And then Saul Hartz, once more the human animal, took himself strongly in hand. Automatically his fists clenched. A revolver ... a knife ... a corrosive acid ... unless he sprang at once he would not be given a chance to get one in before the _Vehmgericht_ put up his number! “I beg your pardon!” The intruder’s polite voice came not an instant too soon. “If I have disturbed you I am sorry. I thought this was my room. It must be next door.” “An easy mistake to make in the dark.” Almost at once Saul Hartz was in full command of the situation. Endor prepared to withdraw. “Off to bed late, aren’t you? What’s the time?” The Colossus looked at his watch. “Nearly a quarter to four.” Surprise flashed across Endor’s dark face. “So late!” he said. “Given up to high-brow talk down below, eh?” Hartz’s cold laugh did not try to conceal the sneer behind it. “Setting the affairs of the universe in order, I daresay.” The answer of John Endor was icy, venomous, slow. “Of the _Planet_ at any rate.” “So!” said the Colossus. “One guessed your program was ambitious. Maybe you’ll find the affairs of the _Planet_ a pretty tough problem, my friend.” And there was a challenge in his voice and in his eyes. Endor’s face grew darker. “No doubt,” he said aloofly. And then, without another word, he turned abruptly and lurched a little unsteadily out of the room. As he did so he switched off the light. The Colossus was able to get an hour or two of troubled sleep. But it was disturbed by bad dreams. Take it altogether it was perhaps the least agreeable night he had ever spent. The arrival of his servant at eight o’clock with tea and shaving water came as a real relief. Never had daylight been quite so welcome. But it was a prelude to a day of tedium broken now and then by moments of acute embarrassment. The other men continued to keep him at arm’s length, and he was at no pains to disguise that he fully reciprocated their feelings. Besides, much of their time seemed to be passed in anxious conclave, of which, although conducted in secret with all the privacy of closed doors, he was not slow to guess the nature.