Smith went straight to the bed, shoved Constantine aside, and laid a soothing hand on the Princess' shoulder.
"I'm a physician," he said in his pleasant, reassuring voice. "What is the trouble, Princess?"
"There's turrible doin's in this here house!" she bawled. "I peeked through the key-hole! Them there Bolsheviki next door is fixin' to blow us all up. I seen the bomb a-sizzlin' and a-fizzlin' on the floor like it was just ready to bust! And then I run and got into bed and I let out a screech——"
"It's all right," said Smith kindly. "It was just a bad dream. There isn't any bomb. Nobody is going to harm you——"
"I didn't dream it! I——"
"Yes, you did. Calm yourself, Princess. You have eaten something which has disagreed with you."
She ceased her screaming at that suggestion and considered it, the tears still streaming over her features. Then she began to blubber again and shook her head.
"I ain't et hoggish," she insisted. "If I had et hoggish I'd think I drempt it. But I ain't et hoggish. That wasn't no dream. No, sir! I had went to bed, but I was fidgety, like I had a load of coal onto my stummick. And by and by I heard them Bolsheviki next door whisperin'. And by and by I heard a fizzlin' noise like they was makin' highballs in there.
"Thinks I to myself that sounds good if true. So I gets up and I lights up and I peeks through the key hole. And I seen King—I mean Monsieur Xenos, and Monsieur Itchenuff, and Puppsky and Wildkatz and a long, black box on the floor in the room next door, and somethin' sticking out of it which fizzled without smokin'——"
"It was all a dream, madame," interposed Smith soothingly. And to my surprise, he took from his inner breast-pocket a small, flat medicine case.