nt of his expenditure. Meanwhile he gave ten
cents to another man in a silk-sleeved cardigan jacket, who had merely
stood by and looked at him while his boots were being polished. There
was a sense of metropolitan affluence in the very atmosphere.

The little table in the adjoining room, on which Theron found his meal
in waiting for him, seemed a vision of delicate napery and refined
appointments in his eyes. He was wolfishly hungry, and the dishes he
looked upon gave him back assurances by sight and smell that he was very
happy as well. The servant in attendance had an extremely white apron
and a kindly black face. He bowed when Theron looked at him, with the
air of a lifelong admirer and humble friend.

"I suppose you'll have claret with your breakfast, sir?" he remarked, as
if it were a matter of course.

"Why, certainly," answered Theron, stretching his legs contentedly
under the table, and tucking the corner of his napkin in his
neckband.--"Certainly, my good man."

CHAPTER XXX

At ten o'clock Theron, loitering near the bookstall in the corridor, saw
Father Forbes come downstairs, pass out through the big front doors, get
into a carriage, and drive away.

This relieved him of a certain sense of responsibility, and he retired
to a corner sofa and sat down. The detective side of him being off duty,
so to speak, there was leisure at last for reflection upon the other
aspects of his mission. Yes; it was high time for him to consider what
he should do next.

It was easier to recognize this fact, however, than to act upon it.
His mind was full of tricksy devices for eluding this task of serious
thought which he sought to impose upon it. It seemed so much pleasanter
not to think at all--but just to drift. He found himself watching with
envy the men who, as they came out from their breakfast, walked over to
the bookstall, and bought cigars from the row of boxes nestling there
among the newspaper piles. They had such evident delight in the work
of selection; they took off the ends of the cigars so carefully, and
lighted them with such meditative attention,--he could see that he was
wofully handicapped by not knowing how to smoke. He had had the most
wonderful breakfast of his life, but even in the consciousness of
comfortable repletion which pervaded his being, there was an obstinate
sense of something lacking. No doubt a good cigar was the thing needed
to round out the perfection of such a breakfast. He half