on a low, gate-legged
table of fibrous, time-blackened oak, together with an orderly array of
periodicals--the white, typographical page of the _Saturday Review_
under the dull rose of _The Living Age_ and chocolate-coloured bulk of
the _Unpopular, Gil Blas_, the mid-week _Boston Transcript_ and
yesterday's _New York Evening Post_. The table bore, in addition, a
green morocco case of dominoes; a mahogany box that, in a recess,
mysteriously maintained a visible cigarette; a study of Beethoven, in
French; an outspread volume by Anatole France, _Jacques Tournebroche_,
in a handsome paper cover; a set of copper ash trays; and a dull red
figurine, holding within its few inches the deathless spirit of a heroic
age. An angle of the wall before him was filled by a white panelled
fireplace, the mantel close against the ceiling; and on the other side
of a doorway, through which he could see Rudolph noiselessly preparing
the dinner table, was a swan-like sofa, in olive wood and pale yellow
satin, from the Venice of the _ottocento_. At his right, beyond a
window, mounted a tall, austere secretary in waxed walnut; and behind
him, under the white chair rail, bookcases extended across the width of
the room. Gustavus Hesselius' portrait of the first Howat Penny hung on
a yellow painted wall, his gilt-braided major's facings still vivid, his
dark, perceptible scorn undimmed. There were, too, framed in oak, a
large photograph of Tamagno, as Othello, with a scrawled, cordial
message; another of a graceful woman in the Page's costume of _Les
Huguenots_, signed "Sempre ... Scalchi"; a water colour drawing by Jan
Beers; and a Victorian lithograph in powdery foliage and brick of _The
Penny Rolling Mills. Jaffa_. A black-blue rug, from Myrtle Forge, partly
covered the broad, oak boards of the floor; and there was a comfortable
variety of chairs--sturdy, painted Dutch, winged Windsors and a slatted
Hunterstown rocker.

Howat Penny's gaze wandered over the familiar furnishing, come to him
surviving the generations of his family, or carefully procured for his
individual dictates. A sense of tranquillity, of haven, deepened about
him. "Rudolph," he inquired, "has Honduras gone for Miss Jannan?"

The man stopped in the doorway, answering in the affirmative. He was
slight, almost fragile, with close, dark hair that stood up across his
forehead, and dry, high-coloured cheeks. Rudolph hesitated, with a
handful of silver; and then returned to his tas