"Glad to see you in these parts--you'll find this a cold climate after London, I'm afraid." He took a careful look at Bent's friend as they all sat down to supper--out of sheer habit of inspecting any man who was new to him.

And after a glance or two he said to himself that this young limb of the law was a sharp chap--a keen-eyed, alert, noticeable fellow, whose every action and tone denoted great mental activity.

He was sharper than Bent, said Cotherstone, and in his opinion, that was saying a good deal.
Bent's ability was on the surface; he was an excellent specimen of the business man of action, who had ideas out of the common but was not so much given to deep and quiet thinking as to prompt doing of things quickly decided on.

He glanced from one to the other, mentally comparing them.

Bent was a tall, handsome man, blonde, blue-eyed, ready of word and laugh; Brereton, a medium-sized, compact fellow, dark of hair and eye, with an olive complexion that almost suggested foreign origin: the sort, decided Cotherstone, that thought a lot and said little.