The notables did not want to talk.
They wanted to be spell-bound--and they were.

Callan sat there in an appropriate attitude--the one in which he was always photographed.

One hand supported his head, the other toyed with his watch-chain.

His face was uniformly solemn, but his eyes were disconcertingly furtive.

He cross-questioned me as to my walk from Canterbury; remarked that the cathedral was a--magnificent--Gothic--Monument and set me right as to the lie of the roads.