I had just finished winding up my watch, which marked half-past ten, when there was a violent ring at my door-bell, followed by a rattling appeal to the knocker. "A telegram!" I exclaimed, falling back in my chair. "The only thing I detest more than a postman. Well, the postman brought an enigma; perhaps the telegram may contain the solution." It was not a telegram, but Calbot, to whom I have already made incidental allusion. He opened the library door without knocking, came swiftly in, and walked up to the fire. This abruptness of manner, which was by no means proper to him, added to something very peculiar in his general aspect and expression, gave me quite a start. He was dressed in light in-door costume, and, in spite of the cold, wore neither top-coat nor gloves. His face had a pallor which would have been extraordinary in anyone, but in a man whose cheek was ordinarily so ruddy and robust as Calbot's, it was almost ghastly. He said nothing for some moments, but seemed to be struggling with an irrepressible and exaggerated physical tremor, resembling St. Vitus's dance. I must say that my nerves have never been more severely tried than by this unexpected apparition, in so strange a guise, of a friend whom I had always looked upon as about the most imperturbable and common-sensible one I had. He was a young man, but older than his years, clear-headed, practical, clever, an excellent lawyer, and a fine fellow. Eccentricity of any kind was altogether foreign to his character. Something very unpleasant, I apprehended, must be at the bottom of his present profound and uncontrollable agitation. Of course I jumped up after the first shock, and shook his hand--which, notwithstanding the cold weather and his own paleness, was dry and hot. I fancied Calbot hardly knew where he was or what he was doing; not that he seemed delirious, but rather overwhelmingly preoccupied about something altogether hateful and ugly. "What's the matter, John?" I said, instinctively using a sharp tone, and laying my hand heavily on his shoulder. "Are you ill?" Then a thought struck me, and I added: "Nothing wrong about Miss Burleigh, I hope?" "Drayton," said my friend--his utterance was interrupted somewhat by the nervous starts and twitches which still mastered his efforts to control them--"something terrible has happened. I wanted to tell you. I can't fathom it. Drayton, I've seen---- May I take a glass of wine?" He drank two glasses in quick succession. As he hardly ever touched wine, there was no little significance in the act. The rich old liquor evidently did him good. To tell the truth, I would rather have given him some brandy. He was not in a state to appreciate a fine flavour, and my port was as rare as it was good. However, I was really concerned about him, and would gladly have given the whole decanterful to set him right again.