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inventions."
    Delia did not reply. She was staring after Franetti, absentmindedly pulling at the corner of a tiny handkerchief with her teeth. Watching her, I knew again the fear she felt, as if again she were feeling a little creature gouging at her temple.
    "Anything to that last remark of Franetti's?" I asked lightly. "Jock doesn't keep white rats for pets by any chance?"
    "I don't know," Delia said abstractedly. "I told you he never lets me in his workroom." Then she looked at me. "You said you wanted to ask me some more questions?"
    I nodded. On the way here I had been revolving in my mind an unpleasant hypothesis. If Jock no longer loved Delia and had some reason for wanting to be rid of her he might be responsible for her suspicions. He had every chance to trick her.
    "You said the change in Jock began to show while you were in London," I said. "Tell me the precise circumstances."
    "He'd always been interested in old books and in genealogy, you see, but never to the same extent," she said, after a thoughtful pause. "In a way it was chance that began it. An accident to his hands. A rather serious one, too. A window fell on them, mashing the fingers badly. Of course a puppeteer's no good without hands, and so Jock had to lay off for three weeks. To help pass the time, he took to visiting the British Museum and the library there. Later he made many visits to other libraries to occupy his time, since he's apt to be very nervous when anything prevents him from working. When the war started we came back, and the London dates were abandoned. He did not work here, either, for quite a long time, but kept up his studies.
    "Then when he was finally ready to start work again he told me he'd decided to work the puppets alone. I pointed out that one man couldn't give a puppet show, since he could only manage two characters at a time. He told me that he was going to confine himself to puppet plays like Punch and Judy , in which there are almost never more than two characters in sight at one time.
    "That was three months ago. From that day he's avoided me. George–" her voice broke "–it's almost driven me crazy. I've had the craziest suspicions. I've even thought that he lost both his hands in the accident and refused to tell!"
    "What?" I shouted. "Do you mean to tell me you don't know?"
    "No. Seems strange, doesn't it? But I can't swear even to that. He never lets me come near, and he wears gloves, except in the dark."
    "But the puppet shows–"
    "That's just it. That's the question I keep asking myself when I sit in the audience and watch the puppets. Who is manipulating them? What's inside them?"
    At that moment I determined to do everything I could to battle Delia's fear.
    "You're not crazy," I said harshly. "But Jock is!"
    She rubbed her hand across her forehead, as it if itched.
    "No," she said softly, "it's the puppets. Just as I told you."
    As we went on upstairs then I could tell that Delia was anxious to get my interview with Jock started. She had had to nerve herself up to it, and delays were not improving her state of mind. But apparently we were fated to have a hard time getting up that flight of stairs.
    This time the interruption came when a slim man in a blue business suit tried to slip in the semi-darkness unnoticed. But Delia recognized him.
    "Why, hello, Dick!" she said. "Don't you know old friends?"
    I made out prim, regular features and a head of thinning neutral-colored hair.
    "Dick, this is George Clayton," Delia was saying. "George, this is Dick Wilkinson. Dick handles my husband's insurance."
    Wilkinson's "Howdya do?" sounded embarrassed and constrained. He wanted to get away.
    "What did Jock want to see you about?" asked Delia, and Wilkinson's apparent embarrassment increased. He coughed, then seemed to make a sudden decision.
    "Jock's been pretty temperamental lately, hasn't he?" he asked Delia.
    She nodded slowly.
    "I thought so," he said. "Frankly, I don't know why he wanted to see me this