when it comes to that!"

"You're incorrigible, Stan," said Leroy, as his guests were taking their
leave. "You'd better settle down yourself first, and leave Shelton
alone."

When they had all gone, the host stood looking at the empty chairs. They
seemed, as it were, typical of the weary, empty hours of his life, and
for the first time a wholesome distaste of it all swept over him. Day
in, day out, an everlasting whirl--wherein he and his companions turned
night into day and spent their lives in a hollow round of gaiety, in
which scandal, cards, women and wine were chief features. And, at the
end! What would be the end?

Then he shook himself from his unaccustomed reverie; Adrien Leroy, the
popular idol of fashionable society, was not given long to
introspection.

"What next?" he asked himself.

It was Norgate who answered the unspoken query, by announcing that the
motor was at the door.

As Adrien descended the stairs, Jasper Vermont entered the hall below
him.

"Ah, just in time!" he said with his amicable smile. "You're off to the
Park, I suppose?"

"I don't know yet," returned Adrien evasively. "What do you think of the
motor?"

"Worthy even of Adrien Leroy," replied Jasper, with the faintest
suspicion of a sneer, which, however, passed unperceived by his friend.
"By the way," he continued, as they walked to the door together, "I have
just left Ada in tears, poor girl; repentance followed closely on
repletion. She vows solemnly to refrain from onions and patchouli for
the future, and begs for the return of your favour."

Leroy smiled gravely at his companion's flippant tones.

"You make an eloquent advocate; but there's little need for pity in her
case; her tastes are natural to her class. I was to blame for not
realising it before; but she'll be well set up for the future," he said,
and forthwith dismissed the subject from his mind. "But Jasper, what of
this chestnut entered the steeplechase?"

Vermont's dark, restless eyes dropped for a moment; then he said
lightly:

"Do you mean that Yorkshire screw? Oh, he is all right! Can't run the
course, I should say, let alone the last rise. Nothing can touch the
roan. If I weren't a beggar, I'd cover 'King Cole's' back with guineas."

"Do it for me," said Leroy carelessly, as he settled into the waiting
Daimler, which was his latest purchase.

"What, another thousand?" asked Jasper almost eagerly.

"Two, if you like," said his friend, as the chauffeur