"I frequently do it. I suffer from insomnia. The accident that deprived me of my sight injured my reason. This is one of my lucid intervals. For years I slept in the open air; the atmosphere of a bedroom stifles me. So I am here."
"And here you are going to remain all night?"
"Yes. I presume you have no objection."
Mrs. May was silent. Did this man know the terrible position he had placed her in? Was he telling the truth, or was he spying on her? Was he dangerous enough to be removed? Or was he the poor creature he represented himself to be?
"You should get your clever friend Tchigorsky to cure you," she said.
"Tchigorsky has gone away. I don't know when I shall see him again."
That was good news, at any rate. Mrs. May stooped to artifice. There were reasons why this man should be got out of the way at present. He had brought danger by his stupid eccentricity, but the bold woman was not going to change her plans for that.
"Be guided by me," she said. "Go to your room."
"I am here till the morning," Ralph said doggedly. "Go to yours. We are a lost, doomed race. What does it matter what I do?"