machine again."

A smile of brotherly forgiveness lit up M. Feriaud's face. The generous
Gallic nature asserted itself. He held out his arms affectionately to
Roland.

"Ah, now you talk. Now you say something," he cried in his impetuous
way. "Embrace me. You are all right."

Roland heaved a sigh of relief when, five minutes later, the aeroplane
disappeared over the brow of the hill. Then he began to sneeze again.

"You're not well, you know," said Mr. Windlebird.

"I've caught cold. We've been flying about all night--that French ass
lost his bearings--and my suit is thin. Can you direct me to a hotel?"

"Hotel? Nonsense." Mr. Windlebird spoke in the bluff, breezy voice
which at many a stricken board-meeting had calmed frantic shareholders
as if by magic. "You're coming right into my house and up to bed this
instant."

It was not till he was between the sheets with a hot-water bottle at
his toes and a huge breakfast inside him that Roland learned the name
of his good Samaritan. When he did, his first impulse was to struggle
out of bed and make his escape. Geoffrey Windlebird's was a name which
he had learned, in the course of his mercantile career, to hold in
something approaching reverence as that of one of the mightiest
business brains of the age.