“That’s what happened,” I said. “I saw the whole thing.”

Tony gaped at me. George said calmly,

“I thought maybe you were the one who slugged him.”

“Well, of all the—You think I was in that armor?”

“You’re too tall,” George said, with the same maddening coolness. “So am I,” he added.

“Hah, that is right.” Blankenhagen looked relieved as the conversation took a rational turn. “I have noticed, with old suits of armor, how small these ancestors of ours were. Diet, of course, and unhealthy living…”

Poor Tony collapsed again. He hit the back of his head, groaned, and swore.

“While you’re standing around arguing about medieval diet I’m slowly bleeding to death, and Schmidt is getting away. I know you don’t care about me, but—”

“Schmidt, of course!” exclaimed the doctor. “He is not here.”

“Oh, damn,” said Tony.

“Come on, get up.” I lent him a strong right arm. “You can’t be much hurt or you wouldn’t be so talkative. Schmidt is the only one of us who could fit into that armor. Let’s go get him.”

George was already halfway up the stairs.

Blankenhagen followed, leaving me to support Tony’s tottering footsteps. When we reached Schmidt’s room we found another crisis in process. The fat little man was lying on his bed and the doctor was bending over him.

“I found him in the doorway,” George said. “Looks like a heart attack.”

“He said he had a bad heart,” I said.

“Maybe we were wrong about him,” Tony said, leaning heavily on my shoulder. “A man with a weak ticker couldn’t go tearing around in armor. If he heard that racket Vicky made and came running out…”

Schmidt’s eyes opened. Involuntarily I stepped back and Tony, deprived of my support, swayed wildly. Schmidt’s face was transformed by the most vivid expression of terror I have ever seen.

“Ruhig sein, Herr Professor,” said Blankenhagen soothingly. “You are better now.”

“But he…” Schmidt mumbled, “Herr Lawrence. He is not…dead.”

Tony was not a reassuring sight; the cut, though shallow, had bled copiously, and his shirt front was a bloody mess. With his hair standing on end and his face white under the dust that smeared one side of it, he was enough to alarm anyone, much less a man who had just had a heart attack. George stepped in front of him.

“Of course he isn’t dead, he’s in great shape. You’re the one we’re concerned about, Schmidt; did you hear something that alarmed you?”

Schmidt’s shriveled eyelids drooped.

“A scream,” he said with difficulty. “Someone screamed….”

His eyes followed George, who was wandering around the room.

“That will do,” Blankenhagen said. “He must rest now.”

The doctor followed us to the door.

“It is not serious,” he said in a low voice. “A faint, shock—not his heart. He will be recovered in the morning. Lawrence, go to bed. A bit of plaster on that cut, that is all you need.”