I shut the door and addressed myself to him roughly.

“Come,” I said. “There’s a necessity for action here. Where can we talk together?”

“How did you find me?” he said, faintly. “It isn’t true, is it?—no—not there”—for I was turning to the door of a back room that seemed to promise privacy.

“Where, then?” I said, impatiently. “Hurry, man! This is no time for dallying.”

He tried to pull himself together. For the moment he seemed utterly unnerved.

“Jason,” cried a voice from the very room I had approached.

I dropped my stick with a crash on the floor.

“Who’s that?” I said, in a loud, wavering voice.

The handle turned. He came weakly from his corner to put himself before me. It was too late, for the door had opened and a woman, with a baby in her arms, was standing on the threshold.

And the woman was Zyp.