Even when he went to bed, Westenhanger lay awake seeking some solution of the problem. At last he realised that he was unlikely to get any further forward; but by that time he had fretted himself into a state of complete wakefulness.
“No use going on like this,” he reflected at last. “I must get something to take my mind off the thing. It’s infernally tantalising to be so near it and yet not to hit on the right track. I’ll go down to the library and get a book. I can read myself to sleep all right—push the affair out of my thoughts. If I lie here I’ll simply worry at it till morning.”
He got up and put on his dressing-gown. His watch showed him that it was in the small hours; and all the house was quiet. He opened his door cautiously, took his candle with him, and went down the stairs.
When he reached the hall below, he was surprised to find a light shining from the open door of old Dangerfield’s study; and as he came opposite the room he looked in. Rollo was sitting, fully dressed, beside the fire; and at the sound of Westenhanger’s approach he glanced up. Westenhanger, feeling that his midnight perambulations demanded some explanation, turned into the study. Rollo showed no surprise but invited him to sit down on the opposite side of the hearth.
“Got a touch of insomnia, to-night,” explained Westenhanger, “so I thought I’d come down for a book and see if I could read myself to sleep. I was just on the way to the library when I saw the light in here.”
Rollo’s face expressed some concern.
“I hope you aren’t subject to it,” he said. “Anything going wrong with one’s sleep is a terrible thing.”
Westenhanger detected more feeling in the comment than he had expected; and for a moment he was surprised. Then it flashed across his mind that Rollo probably knew of Helga’s somnambulism and had thus a keener interest in such matters than most people. He hastened to reassure the old man.
“No; it’s not chronic. Just a touch of it one gets at times.”
A fleeting expression changed Rollo Dangerfield’s face for an instant; but it was gone before Westenhanger could identify it.