gold. Into some attic half filled with lumber he would
fling it by the handful; then, locking the door, leave it there. On
their hands and knees he and his friends, when they wanted any, would
grovel for it, poking into corners, hunting under boxes, groping among
broken furniture, feeling between cracks and crevices. Nothing gave him
greater delight than an expedition of this nature to what he termed his
gold-field; it had for him, as he would explain, all the excitements
of mining without the inconvenience and the distance. He never knew how
much was there. For a certain period a pocketful could be picked up in
five minutes. Then he would entertain a dozen men at one of the best
restaurants in London, tip cabmen and waiters with half-sovereigns,
shower half-crowns as he walked through the streets, lend or give to
anybody for the asking. Later, half-an-hour's dusty search would be
rewarded with a single coin. It made no difference to him; he would dine
in Soho for eighteenpence, smoke shag, and run into debt.

The red-haired man, to whom Deleglise had introduced me on the day of
my first meeting with the Lady of the train, was another of his most
constant visitors. It flattered my vanity that the red-haired man, whose
name was famous throughout Europe and America, should condescend to
confide to me--as he did and at some length--the deepest secrets of his
bosom. Awed--at all events at first--I would sit and listen while by
the hour he would talk to me in corners, telling me of the women he had
loved. They formed a somewhat large collection. Julias, Marias, Janets,
even Janes--he had madly worshipped, deliriously adored so many it grew
bewildering. With a far-away look in his eyes, pain trembling through
each note of his musical, soft voice, he would with bitter jest, with
passionate outburst, recount how he had sobbed beneath the stars for
love of Isabel, bitten his own flesh in frenzied yearning for Lenore. He
appeared from his own account--if in connection with a theme so poetical
I may be allowed a commonplace expression--to have had no luck with
any of them. Of the remainder, an appreciable percentage had been mere
passing visions, seen at a distance in the dawn, at twilight--generally
speaking, when the light must have been uncertain. Never again, though
he had wandered in the neighbourhood for months, had he succeeded in
meeting them. It would occur to me that enquiries among the neighbours,
applications to the loc