"Don't rise, sir!" begged O'Brien. "Lay still now and collect your thoughts. Golly, that was a crack! I told you what would happen, didn't I then? You are needing a nurse, and a steel jacket and a tin lid like the good old times of the late war if so be you are going to get tapped like this."
In a few minutes Mr. Ridgeway was able to sit up, and with a rueful look gazed around at the disordered room. With a little help he got into his chair, and sighed. O'Brien, as though he had always been an inmate of the house, went through the dining-room, and beyond in a little breakfast room found a percolator all ready for breakfast. In a jiffy he had the coffee ready, and returned to Mr. Ridgeway with a steaming cup which he insisted on him drinking. The hot liquid seemed to revive Mr. Ridgeway, and presently he sat up, asking:
"Well, O'Brien and Lawrence, what part did you play in the late unpleasantness?"
O'Brien burst out with an exclamation of anger, "By gosh, sir, this thing is going too far! I don't intend to stand by and see you murdered. You have had a close shave here tonight, and something has _got_ to be done. Where is Mrs. Ridgeway?"
"She is in England visiting some relatives," said Mr. Ridgeway with a triumphant laugh. "So you won't get any backing from her. I sent her over there three months ago."
"Well, _something_ has got to be done all right, all right," said the secret service man sullenly.
Mr. Ridgeway pressed his aching head. "I think this will end it," he said. "They have found no papers, and they will let well enough alone. You know as well as I do, O'Brien, that they will know that I will be on guard after this. And I _will_ be. I will set a lot of detectives around here, each with a badge as big as a dinner plate. And I will sit and do nothing, and you can do the work."
"All right; that is more like what I want to hear," said O'Brien, smiling at last. "You are doing enough, Mr. Ridgeway, when you finance the affair. You have had all those airplanes built, and those dirigibles, and if you sit tight and boss, that is all we will ask for. Just you let me and Lawrence push the rest of the work."
"I will have to keep quiet for a day or two anyway," said Mr. Ridgeway. "I feel sort of old tonight. I wish I had a son or two to look out for me. But you are all right, O'Brien. Do whatever you like."