“Be quiet now, Gustav,” said the tutor. “Bring us come coffee in the coffee-room, if you can get it made, and light a fire in the bedroom. We will talk in the morning.”
Gustav gesticulated delighted acquiescence in any demand his hero made, and ushered them into the coffee-room.
“What a queer fellow!” said Roger when he had vanished in search of the coffee.
“Queer but good-hearted fellow is Gustav,” said the tutor. “I have known him a long time; to-morrow I’ll tell you— Hullo!”
There was but a single candle in the room, and by its dim light, and that of the half-expired fire, they had not at first been able to see that they were not the sole occupants of the apartment. On the sofa lay curled the figure of a man breathing heavily, and, to judge by the spirit-bottle and glasses on the table at his hand, expiating a carouse by a disturbed and feverished slumber.
The tutor raised the candle so that the light fell more clearly on the sleeper. Something in the figure had struck him. The man lay with his face turned towards them. He was stylishly though cheaply dressed. His age may have been forty, and his features were half obscured by a profuse and unkempt sandy beard. This was not what had struck the tutor. In his frequent turnings and tossings the sleeper had contrived to betray the fact that his hirsute appearance was due not to nature but to art. A wire hook had been displaced from the ear, leaving one side of the wig tilted so as to disclose underneath the smooth cheek of a clean-shaven man.
The examination was still in process when Gustav re-entered the room. The clatter with which he put down the cups on the table, aided by the glare of the candle and the tutor’s sharp ejaculation, wakened the sleeper with a start. He was sober enough as he raised his head sharply and sprang to his feet. In doing this the treacherous wig slipped still farther. Before he could raise his hand to replace it Mr Armstrong had stepped forward and torn the mask from his face, disclosing the livid countenance of Mr Robert Ratman!
The surprise on either side was at first beyond reach of words. The miscreant stood staring in a dazed way, first at Armstrong, then at Roger, then at Gustav, who, being a Frenchman, was the first to come to his use of his tongue.
“Mon dieu! Monsieur, this is no bedroom for the gentleman. It is forbidden to sleep all night in the salle à manger.”
“Silence, Gustav! Go for a policeman,” said Armstrong in a tone so strange that the faithful Gustav slunk away like a dog with his tail between his legs.