instinctively that she was, with all her athletic grace,
primarily a womanly woman.

The sun sinking toward the hills across the bay softened the
brown of her skin and, as I observed by watching her closely,
served partially to conceal the nervousness which was wholly
unnatural in a girl of such poise. When she smiled there was a
false note in it; it was forced and it was sufficiently evident
to me that she was going through a mental hell of conflicting
emotions that would have killed a woman of less self-control.

I felt that I would like to be in Fletcher's shoes--doubly so
when, at Kennedy's request, he withdrew, leaving me to witness
the torture of a woman of such fine sensibilities, already hunted
remorselessly by her own thoughts.

Still, I will give Kennedy credit for a tactfulness that I didn't
know the old fellow possessed. He carried through the preliminary
questions very well for a pseudo-doctor, appealing to me as his
assistant on inconsequential things that enabled me to "save my
face" perfectly. When he came to the critical moment of opening
the black bag, he made a very appropriate and easy remark about
not having brought any sharp shiny instruments or nasty black
drugs.

"All I wish to do, Miss Bond, is to make a few, simple little
tests of your nervous condition. One of them we specialists call
reaction time, and another is a test of heart action. Neither is
of any seriousness at all, so I beg of you not to become excited,
for the chief value consists in having the patient perfectly