At least, sir, he asked me if you would likely come downstairs before your company arrived." "Ah! Well, tell the others I'm dining on BUSINESS, and set dinner for two in the blue room." "Yes, sir." Meanwhile, Mr.Leyton--a man of Rushbrook's age, but not so fresh and vigorous-looking--had thrown himself in a chair beside the study fire, after a glance around the handsome and familiar room.

For the house had belonged to a brother millionaire; it had changed hands with certain shares of "Water Front,"-- as some of Rushbrook's dealings had the true barbaric absence of money detail,--and was elegantly and tastefully furnished.

The cuckoo had, however, already laid a few characteristic eggs in this adopted nest, and a white marble statue of a nude and ill-fed Virtue, sent over by Rushbrook's Paris agent, and unpacked that morning, stood in one corner, and materially brought down the temperature.

A Japanese praying-throne of pure ivory, and, above it, a few yards of improper, colored exposure by an old master, equalized each other.
"And what is all this affair about the dinner ?" suddenly asked a tartly-pitched female voice with a foreign accent.
Mr.Leyton turned quickly, and was just conscious of a faint shriek, the rustle of a skirt, and the swift vanishing of a woman's figure from the doorway.

Mr.Leyton turned red.