To lessen the danger he took out his pencil and began to draw the articles of furniture in the room.  He worked into elaborate detail the cupboard, the mantelpiece, and the bed, and from these he passed on to the portraits.  Being possessed of genuine skill, he found the occupation sufficiently absorbing.  It kept the blood in his brain, and that kept him awake.  The pictures, moreover, now that he considered them for the first time, were exceedingly well painted.  Owing to the dim light, he centred his attention upon the portraits beside the fireplace.  On the right was a woman, with a sweet, gentle face and a figure of great refinement; on the left was a full-size figure of a big handsome man with a full beard and wearing a hunting costume of ancient date.

From time to time he turned to the windows behind him, but the vision of the face was not repeated.  More than once, too, he went to the door and listened, but the silence was so profound in the house that he gradually came to believe the plan of attack had been abandoned.  Once he went out on to the balcony, but the sleet stung his face and he only had time to see that the shutters above were closed, when he was obliged to seek the shelter of the room again.

In this way the hours passed.  The fire died down and the room grew chilly.  Shorthouse had made several sketches of the two heads and was beginning to feel overpoweringly weary.  His feet and his hands were cold and his yawns were prodigious.  It seemed ages and ages since the steps had come to listen at his door and the face had watched him from the window.  A feeling of safety had somehow come to him.  In reality he was exhausted.  His one desire was to drop upon the soft white bed and yield himself up to sleep without any further struggle.

He rose from his chair with a series of yawns that refused to be stifled and looked at his watch.  It was close upon three in the morning.  He made up his mind that he would lie down with his clothes on and get some sleep.  It was safe enough, the door was locked on the inside and the window was fastened.  Putting the bag on the table near his pillow he blew out the candles and dropped with a sense of careless and delicious exhaustion upon the soft mattress.  In five minutes he was sound asleep.

There had scarcely been time for the dreams to come when he found himself lying side-ways across the bed with wide open eyes staring into the darkness.  Someone had touched him, and he had writhed away in his sleep as from something unholy.  The movement had awakened him.

The room was simply black.  No light came from the windows and the fire had gone out as completely as if water had been poured upon it.  He gazed into a sheet of impenetrable darkness that came close up to his face like a wall.

His first thought was for the papers in his coat and his hand flew to the pocket.  They were safe; and the relief caused by this discovery left his mind instantly free for other reflections.