e conducted to the common room, a spacious apartment
immediately under the dome. At one end a huge stone fireplace, in which
a fire crackled cheerfully.

"'Non Possumus,'" read Indiman, deciphering the motto chiselled upon
the chimney-breast.

"An admirable sentiment indeed! Dr. Magnus, I venture to infer that the
Utinam Club is the child of your own brain. Permit me, sir, to
congratulate you--a glorious inception and carried out to perfection."

Dr. Magnus smiled frostily. "I thank you, Mr. Indiman," he said,
staring hard at him. "In a civilization so complex as ours the Utinam
undoubtedly fills a want. And now, gentlemen, if you will excuse me; I
have some affairs of moment. The club is yours; make use of it as you
will. You are already acquainted with Mr. Hoyt, I believe. The other
gentlemen--but opportunity will doubtless serve." He bowed and withdrew.

Indiman dropped into an easy-chair and lit a cigar. "Les miserables,"
he said to me in an undertone. "Look at them."

In truth, it was a strange company with whom we had foregathered. There
were perhaps a dozen men in the room, and each seemed absorbed in the
listless contemplation of his own dejected personality. The large table
in the centre of the room was laden with newspapers and periodicals,
but no one had taken the trouble to displace the neat files in which
they had been arranged. The card-room adjoining was untenanted; the
green-baize tables, with their complement of shiny, new packs of cards
and metal counters, bore no evidence of use; in the billiard-room at
the back a marker slept restfully in his high-legged chair. Assuredly,
the members of the Utinam Club were not advocates of the strenuous life.

It was after six o'clock now, and the big room was beginning to fill up
with later arrivals. Yet there was none of the cheerful hum and bustle
ordinarily characteristic of such a gathering. A man would enter and
pass to his place unfavored by even the courtesy of a friendly glance;
at least a score of men had made their first appearance within the last
quarter of an hour, and not a single word of greeting or recognition
had I heard exchanged. Among them was Mr. Colman Hoyt, the unsuccessful
Arctic explorer. He passed close to where Indiman and I sat, yet never
looked at us. An odd set, these our fellow-members of the Utinam, and
one naturally wondered why they came to the club at all. But we were
now to learn.

As I have said, the building was entirely