Still he fought back, and there were even moments when he felt, fleetingly, the old symptoms of vitality and spiritual health. He threw himself into his practical concerns, toiling hugely at the job, and perpetually carrying out improvements in the heating and lighting of the loft, till in the end it was almost comfortable. When the thick, smelly heat of the oil-stove, and the mellow glow of the well-trimmed lamps, made the loft friendly on a stormy winter night, and he could stretch out his legs and allow his mind to sink into vacancy, while Betty sat patching up some garment and Froulish dozed in his corner or bent over his stack of type­script, Charles almost felt secure.

Almost, but never quite, even at his best moments. And his worst were unspeakable. Sometimes the sense of desolation would flow over him so deeply that his being would cry out, not for relief, not for the achievement of his desire, but merely for the choice of some other kind of suffering. How he would have welcomed a chance to exchange his mental torment for some painful physical ailment!

At last, on the evening of the day of Ern’s question, he capitu­lated. He put his best clothes on again and went off to the Grand Hotel to see if he could find anyone to give him information about her.

It proved surprisingly easy. The barman in the Oak Lounge readily accepted a couple of gins and, in return, came out with the facts.

That was Mr. Roderick and his niece. They were often in here. Mr. Roderick was managing director of a local factory; he had only recently moved into the district, after having travelled extensively on behalf of the firm and managed their affairs in America and on the Continent. The niece was an orphan, whom Mr. Roderick, as befitted a rich, benevolent bachelor, had brought up, and now that her education was over, she lived in his house. Charles left the hotel saddened, and yet strangely elated. The hopelessness of his position was underlined still further; he could never gain access to Mr. Roderick’s social sphere, and certainly not to his house; besides, the barman had indicated that the Rodericks spent much of their time in London and Paris, Switzer­land and Capri. Whence, then, the curious elation? Partly because the very futility of his task stimulated a curious beating rhythm in the depths of his mind, hammering out faintly but persistently, ‘Stranger things have happened. Stranger things have happened.’