The lieutenant knocked at Ernest's door in the middle of the night. "Mister Hotaling!" he called urgently.
Ernest fumbled into a pair of pants and opened the door.
"One of the men found this thing," the lieutenant said. "We were going to keep it locked up till morning but it's driving me crazy. Figured you'd better have a look at it."
The thing was a blue-green puppet of a creature wearing—or made of—a kind of metallic sailcloth. It was about three feet tall, a caricature of a human being. It hung limp by one arm from the lieutenant's grasp, its head lolling on its shoulder.
"What is it?" Ernest asked sleepily, "a doll?"
"No; it's just playing dead now. It was doing a clog step in the cage before." He gave the thing a shake. "The worst of it is, it hummed all the time. And the humming seems to mean something."
"Bring it in here," Ernest said. He was fully awake now. "Put it in the armchair and stick around in case I can't handle it."
The creature sat awkwardly where it was put. But then the eyes, which a moment ago had seemed to be painted on the face, shifted and looked squarely at Ernest. It hummed at him.
"I see what you mean," he told the lieutenant. "It seems to be trying to communicate. It's the same language as on the coils." He stared at it. "I wish it didn't remind me of Raggedy Andy. Where did you find it?"
"In the throneroom of the palace. One of the men on guard there grabbed it as it came out of a panel in the wall. He grabbed it and it went limp, like a doll."