"I saw your light," he said. "I don't seem to be able to sleep, somehow.
It is so infernally hot and still. I suppose there is going to be a
thunderstorm. I hate thunderstorms. They frighten me." The little man
was speaking like a peevish child.
"Oh, well--! it will at least clear the air," said Rudolph Musgrave.
"Sit down and have a smoke, won't you?"
"No, thanks." Charteris had gone to the bookshelves and was gently
pushing and pulling at the books so as to arrange their backs in a
mathematically straight line. "I thought I would borrow something to
read--Why, this is the Tennyson you had at college, isn't it? Yes, I
remember it perfectly."
These two had roomed together through their college days.
"Yes; it is the old Tennyson. And yonder is the identical Swinburne you
used to spout from, too. Lord, Jack, it seems a century since I used to
listen by the hour to _The Triumph of Time and Dolores!_"
"Ah, but you didn't really care for them--not even then." Charteris
reached up, his back still turned, and moved a candlestick the fraction
of an inch.
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