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She bolted into her room as the door of Hamon's chamber opened and his pyjamaed figure showed.

"Something struck?" asked Hamon.

Lord Creith turned his head.

"One of your trees, my dear fellow," he said with satisfaction. "By Jove! I only just realised that it wasn't my tree!"

And, consoled by the knowledge that there really was nothing to justify any personal worry, his lordship went back to bed, undisturbed by the cannon of the heavens or the lightning which lit up his room at irregular intervals.

Joan's was the only room in Creith Hall that possessed the luxury of an adjoining bathroom, and she was sufficiently feminine, as she stripped off her wet clothes, to be absorbed for the moment in the thoroughness of her soaking to the partial exclusion of all thoughts of her adventure.

She came back to the problem of Mr. Morlake as she sat in bed nursing her knees and watching through the open window the passage of the storm. The chestnut tree was smoking and the lightning gave her a glimpse of two brass-helmetted men gazing impotently at the ruin. The village fire brigade was, in point of costume, an exact replica of its great metropolitan model. It was only on the minor point of efficiency that it fell short.