age-boy came through, after tapping, with a telegram on a
salver.

Dick was writing to Hamilton's, in Berners Street, about a question of
gray mats for the spare bedroom, and he took the telegram and tore open
the envelope with a preoccupied air. Then he uttered a small
exclamation.

"Any answer, sir?"

"No. Yes.... Wait a second."

He took a telegraph-form with almost indecent haste, addressed it to
John Kirkby, Barham, Yorks, and wrote below:

"_Certainly; will expect you dinner and sleep_.--RICHARD
GUISELEY."

Then, when the boy had gone, he read again the telegram he had received:

"_Have received letter from Frank; can probably discover
address if I come to town. Can you put me up
to-night?_--JACK KIRKBY, Barham."

He pondered it a minute or so. Then he finished his note to Hamilton's,
but it was with a distracted manner. Then for several minutes he walked
up and down his rooms with his hands in his jacket-pockets, thinking
very deeply. He was reflecting how remarkable it was that he should hear
of Frank again just at this time, and was wondering what the next move
of Providence would be.

The rest of Dick's day was very characteristic of him; and considering
my other personages in this story and their occupations, I take a
dramatic sort of pleasure in writing it down.

He went out to lunch with a distinguished lady of his
acquaintance--whose name I forbear to give; she was not less than
seventy years old, and the two sat talking scandal about all their
friends till nearly four o'clock. The Talgarth affair, even, was
discussed in all its possible lights, and Dick was quite open about his
own part in the matter. He knew this old lady very well, and she knew
him very well. She was as shrewd as possible and extremely experienced,
and had helped Dick enormously in various intricacies and troubles of
the past; and he, on the other hand, as a well-informed bachelor, was of
almost equal service to her. She was just the least bit in the world
losing touch with things (at seventy you cannot do everything), and Dick
helped to keep her in touch. He lunched with her at least once a week
when they were both in town.

At four he went to the Bath Club, ordered tea and toast and cigarettes,
and sat out, with his hat over his eyes, on the balcony, watching the
swimmers. There was a boy of sixteen who dived with surprising skill,
and Dick took the greatest possible pleasure in observing him. T