But as moment after moment passed, and Lucy Kingdon showed no sign of returning consciousness, growing alarm awakened me thoroughly. I soused her head and face and chafed her wrists, but with no perceptible effect. I could feel no pulse, could detect no respiration; perhaps this was something more serious than a mere fainting spell. I should have told Godfrey to summon a physician.
I was relieved at last to hear a step turn in at the gate, and a moment later a patrolman appeared at the door—a rotund and somnolent German, whose somnolency gave place to snorts of mingled terror and astonishment when he saw the two bodies.
"Mein Gott!" he ejaculated. "Two of t'em!"
"No; only one as yet," I corrected. "But there may be two if something isn't done to save this one pretty quick," and I bent again over Lucy Kingdon and chafed her hands.
"Hass she fainted?" he asked.
"That or just naturally dropped dead," I said. "She's been like this for fifteen or twenty minutes."
He came to the bed, stooped down, and pressed back one of her eyelids.
"She ain't dead," he said. "She's chust fainted. I know a trick," and before I could interfere, he gave her ear a cruel tweak.
"Why, you scoundrel!" I began, but a sigh from the couch interrupted me. I turned to see Lucy Kingdon's dark eyes staring up at me.
"You see," he said triumphantly. "I nefer knowed it to fail."