Page:Walpole--portrait of man with red hair.djvu/320

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316
PORTRAIT OF A MAN

can't any more. I've had enough. He's mad, I tell you——"

A kind rough voice said to him: "That's all right, my friend. That's all over. No harm done——"

My friend! That sounded good. He looked round him and in the distance saw Dunbar. He broke into smiles holding out his hand.

"Dunbar, old man! That's fine. So you're all right?'

Dunbar came over, sat on his bed, putting his arm around him.

"All right? I should think so. So are we all. Even Jabez isn't much the worse. That devil missed his eyes, thank heaven. He'll have two scars to the end of his time to remind him, though."

Harkness sat up. He knew now where he was, on a sofa in the hall—in the hall with the tattered banners and the clock that coughed like a dog. He looked at the clock—just a quarter to seven! Only three-quarters of an hour since that awful knock on the door.

Then he saw Hesther.

"Oh, thank God!" he whispered to himself. "Nunc dimittis...."

She came to him. The three sat together on the sofa, the bearded man (the doctor from the village under the cliff, Harkness afterwards found) standing back, looking at them, smiling.