mmond," he continued, looking across at his _vis-a-vis_, "we look
to you to give expression to our sentiments. Your career at the bar
had given you a command of language, also a self-control not
vouchsafed to us ordinary mortals. Explain to Sir John our feelings."

Drummond, a few years older, dark, clean-shaven, with bright eyes and
humorous mouth, laid down his paper and turned towards Sir John. He
removed his cigarette from his lips and waved it gently in the air.

"Holcroft," he remarked, "in bald language, and with the usual
limitations of his clouded intellect, has still given some slight
expression to the consternation which I believe I may say is general
amongst us. We looked upon you, my dear Sir John, with reverence,
almost with awe. You represented to us the immaculate Briton, the one
Englishman who typified the Saxonism, if I may coin a word, of our
race. We have seen great and sober-minded men come to this unholy
city, and become degenerates. We have known men who have come here for
no other purpose than to prove their unassailable virtue, who have
strode into the arena of temptation, waving the--the what is it--the
white flower of a blameless life, only to exchange it with marvellous
facility for the violets of the Parisienne. But you, Ferringhall, our
pattern, an erstwhile Sheriff of London, a county magistrate, a
prospective politician, a sober and an upright man, one who, had he
aspired to it, might even have filled the glorious position of Lord
Mayor--James, a whisky and Apollinaris at once. I cannot go on. My
feelings overpower me."

"You all seem to be trying to pull my leg," Sir John remarked quietly.
"I suppose you'll come to the point soon--if there is one."

Drummond shook his head in melancholy fashion.

"He dissembles," he said. "After all, how easy the descent is, even
for the greatest of us. I hope that James will not be long with that
whisky and Apollinaris. My nerves are shaken. I require stimulant."

Sir John seated himself deliberately.

"I should imagine," he said, shaking out a copy of _The Times_, "that
it is your brain which is addled."

Drummond looked up with mock eagerness.

"This," he exclaimed, "must be either the indifference of an utterly
callous nature, or it may be--ye gods, it may be--innocence. Holcroft,
we may have been mistaken."

"Think not," that young man remarked laconically.

"I will put the question," Drummond said gravely. "Ferringhall, were
you or wer