I gave him back the slip of paper. I don’t know why, and now I wish I hadn’t. I would like to have it now, beside that fiver. “Nice, fivers are....” Thoughtful Iris! She knew her friends, she did. Lying lonely here ... and having an afterthought about Hilary--and me! “If they should somehow happen to hear and call.” Poor Guy hadn’t a mention. She wasn’t for putting any strain on Guy’s lawfulness. But why lawfulness? I looked at Conrad Masters. “Septic poisoning,” said Masters. “That’s the trouble.” That meant very little to me, for never was a man so ill-informed about such things. “But,” I said doubtfully to those gentle-worried eyes, and he murmured: “Sure you’re not thinking of ptomaine poisoning? Not that that isn’t quite enough to be going on with....” “Pain,” I said. “Good Lord, pain....” All I could think of was pain, pain, pain. One can almost feel the stabs of some one’s pain. Worst of all, one can mentally hear the faint screams of a voice just recognisable. Conrad Masters, the sight of him, reminded me vividly of Anna Estella’s pain. Once, from a waiting-room, I had heard her screaming. “Pain?” I said. “Oh, no ... no.” He weighed the matter. “Nothing to speak of. Just keep still, that’s the main thing. Very still, for weeks and weeks. Long business, you know. But what worries a man is that she doesn’t try to help herself at all. Letting herself go ... can’t tell whether consciously or not, but somewhere inside her just not caring. I’ve been sharp with her.... Nice business for me, isn’t it? Good Lord, nice! If only she’d take a pull, pull herself together ... some one just give her mind a jab somehow. No good talking, of course. If she won’t, she won’t. Lies there, you know, just not caring....” He was drawing on a fur-lined glove, and it was to that he spoke; almost, one thought, shyly. A curious, complex gentleman. “She’s said once or twice she’d like to see you and ... well, learn you a thing or two. Some stuff about roses and dandelions. You seem to have made a _gaffe_ somewhere, and it’s quite on her mind to tell you about it. Hope I’m not giving anything away ... but might do her good just to see you, feel you’re round about. You can’t tell. We’ll see how she is to-morrow. Extraordinary, I’ve found it, the way a woman will wake up for a second from days of delirium for no other purpose than to feel lonely.... Not awake now, though. Ill, this evening. Can’t really, you see, be iller if she tried. It will be good news, really good news, if she is alive in the morning. That’s as much as I can say. Sorry.... Well, I must snatch some dinner....” We were outside. The rain had ceased, it was much warmer. The Masters’s Renault, sleek and shining black but for the scarlet wheels, dwarfed my taxi.