"His asthma's awf'ly bad; you can hear him
wheezin' from the street."

He seemed amused.

"There 's no such thing as moral asthma, I suppose?" said Shelton.

His neighbour dropped his eyeglass.

"Here, take this away; it's overdone;" said he. "Bring me some lamb."

Shelton pushed his table back.

"Good-night," he said; "the Stilton's excellent!"

His neighbour raised his brows, and dropped his eyes again upon his
plate.

In the hall Shelton went from force of habit to the weighing-scales and
took his weight. "Eleven stone!" he thought; "gone up!" and, clipping a
cigar, he sat down in the smoking-room with a novel.

After half an hour he dropped the book. There seemed something rather
fatuous about this story, for though it had a thrilling plot, and was
full of well-connected people, it had apparently been contrived to throw
no light on anything whatever. He looked at the author's name; everyone
was highly recommending it. He began thinking, and staring at the
fire....

Looking up, he saw Antonia's second brother, a young man in the Rifles,
bending over him with sunny cheeks and lazy smile, clearly just a little
drunk.

"Congratulate you, old chap! I say, what made you grow that b-b-eastly
beard?"

Shelton grinned.

"Pillbottle of the Duchess!" read young Dennant, taking up the book.
"You been reading that? Rippin', is n't it?"

"Oh, ripping!" replied Shelton.

"Rippin' plot! When you get hold of a novel you don't want any rot
about--what d'you call it?--psychology, you want to be amused."

"Rather!" murmured Shelton.

"That's an awfully good bit where the President steals her diamonds
There's old Benjy! Hallo, Benjy!"

"Hallo, Bill, old man!"

This Benjy was a young, clean-shaven creature, whose face and voice and
manner were a perfect blend of steel and geniality.

In addition to this young man who was so smooth and hard and cheery, a
grey, short-bearded gentleman, with misanthropic eyes, called Stroud,
came up; together with another man of Shelton's age, with a moustache
and a bald patch the size of a crown-piece, who might be seen in the
club any night of the year when there was no racing out of reach of
London.

"You know," began young Dennant, "that this bounder"--he slapped the
young man Benjy on the knee--"is going to be spliced to-morrow. Miss
Casserol--you know the Casserols--Muncaster Gate."

"By Jove!" said Shelton, delighted to be able to say something they
would understand.