oke with a low voice, never addressing himself to any but his
neighbour, and even to his neighbour saying but little. But he looked
like a gentleman, was well dressed, and never awkward. After dinner
he would occasionally play another rubber; but twelve o'clock always
saw him back into his own rooms. No one knew better than Mr. Maule
that the continual bloom of lasting summer which he affected requires
great accuracy in living. Late hours, nocturnal cigars, and midnight
drinkings, pleasurable though they may be, consume too quickly the
free-flowing lamps of youth, and are fatal at once to the husbanded
candle-ends of age.

But such as his days were, every minute of them was precious to him.
He possessed the rare merit of making a property of his time and not
a burden. He had so shuffled off his duties that he had now rarely
anything to do that was positively disagreeable. He had been a
spendthrift; but his creditors, though perhaps never satisfied, had
been quieted. He did not now deal with reluctant and hard-tasked
tenants, but with punctual, though inimical, trustees, who paid to
him with charming regularity that portion of his income which he was
allowed to spend. But that he was still tormented with the ambition
of a splendid marriage it might be said of him that he was completely
at his ease. Now, as he lit his cigarette, he would have been
thoroughly comfortable, were it not that he was threatened with
disturbance by his son. Why should his son wish to see him, and thus
break in upon him at the most charming hour of the day? Of course
his son would not come to him without having some business in hand
which must be disagreeable. He had not the least desire to see his
son,--and yet, as they were on amicable terms, he could not deny
himself after the receipt of his son's note. Just at one, as he
finished his first cigarette, Gerard was announced.

"Well, Gerard!"

"Well, father,--how are you? You are looking as fresh as paint, sir."

"Thanks for the compliment, if you mean one. I am pretty well. I
thought you were hunting somewhere."

"So I am; but I have just come up to town to see you. I find you have
been smoking;--may I light a cigar?"

"I never do smoke cigars here, Gerard. I'll offer you a cigarette."
The cigarette was reluctantly offered, and accepted with a shrug.
"But you didn't come here merely to smoke, I dare say."

"Certainly not, sir. We do not often trouble each other, father; but
there are th