Joan Thursday: A Novel. Vance Louis Joseph

down his head to hers. And her mouth fastened to his with clinging lips…

      Half stunned by receipt of that mad caress, one thought shot like light through the turmoil of his senses: this was never Venetia!

      With an effort he straightened his neck against the pressure of the woman's arm. She strove to overcome his resistance, wooing him in accents hushed, shaking with passion:

      "Vincent … sweetheart!.."

      He interrupted hastily: "I beg pardon!" The inadequacy of that stilted form, disgusting him, he added: "I am John Matthias."

      Immediately the woman released him and, with a gasp, sank back against the newel-post. Her breath came gustily, with a sound like smothered sobbing. Pitifully he divined her shame and terror; and though he knew her very well, beyond mistake, he said evenly: "Don't worry – there isn't any light."

      In a stupefied voice she iterated: "No light – ?"

      "It's so confounded' dark," he complained: "I couldn't tell you from Eve. So perhaps you'd better run back to your room now…"

      He turned away deliberately. Behind him, after a pause of an instant, there rose a sound of soft rustling draperies, a swift and hushed patter of footsteps on the stairs. A moment or two later a latch clicked very gently in the corridor above.

      Quietly Matthias switched on a single light, returned to the door, unbolted and quickly opened it.

      He was not disappointed that this manœuvre surprised a shadow skulking in the penumbra of rose bushes that bordered the steps, the shadow of a man who drew back swiftly when he recognized Matthias. This last stepped out, turned in the direction of the fugitive shadow, and pursuing at leisure, hailed in a quiet and natural tone: "I say – Marbridge! – that you?"

      Immediately he came upon Marbridge at a standstill round the corner of the house, awaiting him in a curious posture of antagonism: his feet well apart, heavy body inclined a trifle forward, round dark head low between his shoulders, hands clenched, upon his face a cloud of anger.

      Matthias greeted him suavely: "I was afraid I'd locked you out." Ignoring his attitude even as he seemed to ignore the fact that Marbridge had changed from evening dress to a suit of dark flannels, he added: "Coming in now? It's a bit late."

      Marbridge pulled himself together. "Perhaps you're right," he assented surlily. But it was with patent effort that he mastered his resentment and accompanied Matthias back to the doors.

      "A fine night, what?" Matthias filled in the awkward silence.

      "Yes," agreed Marbridge brusquely. "Too fine," he amended – "too fine to waste in bed."

      "Sleepless, eh?"

      "Yes."

      Following him in, Matthias refastened the door. "Several of us seem troubled with the same indisposition," he observed coolly, swinging to face Marbridge. "That's why I bothered to call you in, you know."