To this pleasant reflection he sat down on the hard chair and smiled happily. Friends is a lovely word to play with when one has been over long neglected. He wished she would sit too, and make a pillow for his head, but instead she was flitting from place to place acting in the oddest way. From the camp bed she had dragged Blayney's kit bag and was buttoning it into an old dressing gown provided for his use.
"I must have a head," she was saying, which sounded idiotic to Richard who saw that her own was beautiful.
He pointed to a bronze bust of Van Diest which had been placed on the mantelpiece a few days before, presumably to act as a reminder of the influence dominating the apartment.
"Try that one," he suggested, laughing inanely.
But Auriole did not laugh. She gave a glad cry and called on him to help. Together they carried the bust and soon had tied it securely inside the dressing gown.
It did not occur to Richard to ask the reason why this strange dummy had been created. It was all of a piece with the dream-like spirit which pervaded everything. Her explanation was voluntary.
"It's to put in your bed," she said. "We'll take out the electric bulbs, then start the bells going. When they come in and you don't answer they'll go into the bedroom. They'll find this and think it's you."
"Think this is me!" said Richard. "That's funny." He broke into a storm of laughter which ended as abruptly as it began, ended from a sudden realisation that all this folly and mummery was a real and solid effort to compass his escape. "Wait a bit," he said, rubbing his brow fiercely. "It's coming back. I see the idea. Bless you, for trying. We'll have a shot."
He dragged the dummy into the inner room by the waist cord of the dressing gown which was tied about its neck. The brain fog was gone. He was surprisingly clear headed now, and an unnatural vitality buoyed him up. The bedroom door swung to behind him and he heard Auriole cry:
"I'm doing the lights, be quick."