sat down so that he could not see her
face.

"If there is one thing to set against the wholesome life it is
adventure," Chaffery was saying. "But let every adventurer pray for an
early death, for with adventure come wounds, and with wounds come
sickness, and--except in romances--sickness affects the nervous
system. Your nerve goes. Where are you then, my boy?"

"Ssh! what's that?" said Lewisham.

It was a rap at the house door. Heedless of the flow of golden wisdom,
he went out at once and admitted a gentleman friend of Madam Gadow,
who passed along the passage and vanished down the staircase. When he
returned Chaffery was standing to go.

"I could have talked with you longer," he said, "but you have
something on your mind, I see. I will not worry you by guessing
what. Some day you will remember ..." He said no more, but laid his
hand on Lewisham's shoulder.

One might almost fancy he was offended at something.

At any other time Lewisham might have been propitiatory, but now he
offered no apology. Chaffery turned to Ethel and looked at her
curiously for a moment. "Good-bye," he said, holding out his hand to
her.

On the doorstep Chaffery regarded Lewisham with the same curious look,
and seemed to weigh some remark. "Good-bye," he said at last with
something in his manner that kept Lewisham at the door for a moment
looking after his stepfather's receding figure. But immediately the
roses were uppermost again.

When he re-entered the living room he found Ethel sitting idly at her
typewriter, playing with the keys. She got up at his return and sat
down in the armchair with a novelette that hid her face. He stared at
her, full of questions. After all, then, they had not come. He was
intensely disappointed now, he was intensely angry with the ineffable
young shop-woman in black. He looked at his watch and then again, he
took a book and pretended to read and found himself composing a
scathing speech of remonstrance to be delivered on the morrow at the
flower-shop. He put his book down, went to his black bag, opened and
closed it aimlessly. He glanced covertly at Ethel, and found her
looking covertly at him. He could not quite understand her expression.

He fidgeted into the bedroom and stopped as dead as a pointer.

He felt an extraordinary persuasion of the scent of roses. So strong
did it seem that he glanced outside the room door, expecting to find a
box there, mysteriously arrived. But there was no scent of