Page:Leon Wilson - Ruggles of Red Gap.djvu/303

Rh. His eyes fell, his bravado vanished, he fumbled with the cutlery. Quite abashed he was.

"Come, your explanation!" I said curtly, divining that the moment was one in which to adopt a tone with him. He wriggled a bit, crumpling a roll with panic fingers.

"Come, come!" I commanded.

His face brightened, though with an intention most obviously false. He coughed—a cough of pure deception. Not only were his eyes averted from mine, but they were glassed to an uncanny degree. The fingers wrought piteously at the now plastic roll.

"My word, the chap was taken bad; had to be seen to, what! Revived, I mean to say. All piano Johnnies that way—nervous wrecks, what! Spells! Spells, man—spells!"

"Come, come!" I said crisply. The glassed eyes were those of one hypnotized.

"In the carriage—to the hyphen chap's place, to be sure. Fainting spell—weak heart, what! No stimulants about. Passing house! Perhaps have stimulants—heart tablets, er—beer—things of that sort. Lead him in. Revive him. Quite well presently, but not well enough to go on. Couldn't let a piano Johnny die on our hands, what! Inquest, evidence, witnesses—all that silly rot. Save his life, what! Presence of mind! Kind hearts, what! Humanity! Do as much for any chap. Not let him die like a dog in the gutter, what! Get no credit, though" His curiously mechanical utterance trailed off to be lost in a mere husky murmur. The glassy stare was still at my wall.

I have in the course of my eventful career had occasion