"Does Mr. Chesney himself wish it?"
"Mr. Chesney is unconscious, madam."
Sophy sat up, supporting herself by one arm along the back of the couch. Her great, dark, passionately tired eyes, and the small, composed, neutral-tinted eyes of the valet met in a look of questioning on her part, of quiet but noncommittal decision on his.
"Unconscious? How? A heavy sleep?"
"No, madam; more a state of syncope, I should say."
"Since when?"
"He sank into it about six o'clock this morning. He was very bad last night, madam—delirious. I had some difficulty in quieting him."
Sophy looked at him steadily, in silence. Then she said:
"Did you give him some of that strong medicine you use—that Indian medicine?"
"Yes, madam."