Page:Biggers and Ritchie - Inside the Lines.djvu/70

 eyes of glass glowing dimly in the shadow—seemed to flicker palely with a light all their own. Captain Woodhouse, sitting under the white spray of the shaded incandescent, looked up carelessly to meet the stare.

"Why, they give me plenty of time to enjoy myself," he answered, with a light laugh. "They say in 1932"

"Nineteen thirty-two!" Doctor Koch stepped lightly to the closed folding doors, trundled them back an inch to assure himself nobody was in the waiting-room, then closed and locked them. He did similarly by a hidden door on the opposite side of the room, which Woodhouse had not seen. After that he pulled a chair close to his visitor and sat down, his knees almost touching the other's. He spoke very low, in German:

"If your trouble is so serious that you will die—in 1932, I must, of course, examine you for—symptoms."

For half a minute the two men looked fixedly at each other. Woodhouse's right hand went slowly to the big green scarab stuck in his cravat. He pulled the pin out, turned it over