"That's what I don't know," said the Professor gloomily, and staring again into the fire. "That's what I don't know." The Father grew more astonished. "Don't know!" he exclaimed. And he laid down his pipe. "Let's say--d'you think I'm attractive, that there's anything about me which might draw a--a human being, or an animal, irresistibly to me?" "Whether you desired it or not?" "Exactly--or--no, let us say definitely--if I did not desire it." Father Murchison pursed up his rather full, cherubic lips, and little wrinkles appeared about the corners of his blue eyes. "There might be, of course," he said, after a pause. "Human nature is weak, engagingly weak, Guildea. And you're inclined to flout it. I could understand a certain class of lady--the lion-hunting, the intellectual lady, seeking you. Your reputation, your great name----" "Yes, yes," Guildea interrupted, rather irritably--"I know all that, I know." He twisted his long hands together, bending the palms outwards till his thin, pointed fingers cracked. His forehead was wrinkled in a frown. "I imagine," he said,--he stopped and coughed drily, almost shrilly--"I imagine it would be very disagreeable to be liked, to be run after--that is the usual expression, isn't it--by anything one objected to." And now he half turned in his chair, crossed his legs one over the other, and looked at his guest with an unusual, almost piercing interrogation. "Anything?" said the Father. "Well--well, anyone. I imagine nothing could be more unpleasant." "To you--no," answered the Father. "But--forgive me, Guildea, I cannot conceive you permitting such intrusion. You don't encourage adoration." Guildea nodded his head gloomily. "I don't," he said, "I don't. That's just it. That's the curious part of it, that I----" He broke off deliberately, got up and stretched. "I'll have a pipe, too," he said. He went over to the mantelpiece, got his pipe, filled it and lighted it. As he held the match to the tobacco, bending forward with an enquiring expression, his eyes fell upon the green baize that covered Napoleon's cage. He threw the match into the grate, and puffed at the pipe as he walked forward to the cage. When he reached it he put out his hand, took hold of the baize and began to pull it away. Then suddenly he pushed it back over the cage. "No," he said, as if to himself, "no." He returned rather hastily to the fire and threw himself once more into his armchair. "You're wondering," he said to Father Murchison. "So am I. I don't know at all what to make of it. I'll just tell you the facts and you must tell me what you think of them. The night before last, after a day of hard work--but no harder than usual--I went to the front door to get a breath of air. You know I often do that." "Yes, I found you on the doorstep when I first came here."