In an hour the limb was set--a masterly display of skill--and, except
to give orders, Toddy had scarcely spoken another word. As he was
washing his hands in a corner of the dressing-room he beckoned to me.

"How was it caused?" he whispered.

"No one seems to know, sir."

"Doesn't matter much, anyway! Let him lie a wee bit, and then get him
home. Ye'll have no trouble with him, but there'll be no more warbling
and cutting capers for him this yet awhile."

And Toddy, too, went. He had showed not the least curiosity as to
Alresca's personality, and I very much doubt whether he had taken the
trouble to differentiate between the finest tenor in Europe and a
chorus-singer. For Toddy, Alresca was simply an individual who sang
and cut capers.

I made the necessary dispositions for the transport of Alresca in an
hour's time to his flat in the Devonshire Mansion, and then I sat down
near him. He was white and weak, but perfectly conscious. He had
proved himself to be an admirable patient. Even in the very crisis of
the setting his personal distinction and his remarkable and finished
politeness had suffered no eclipse. And now he lay there, with his
silky mustache disarranged and his hair damp, exactly as I had once
seen him on the couch in the garden by the sea in the third act of
"Tristan," the picture of nobility. He could not move, for the
sufficient reason that a strong splint ran from his armpit to his
ankle, but his arms were free, and he raised his left hand, and