gether with a muttered exclamation.
The others looked at him in surprise.

'Chess!' repeated Trent. 'Do you know,' he said, rising and approaching
Marlowe, 'what was the first thing I noted about you at our first
meeting? It was your eye, Mr Marlowe. I couldn't place it then, but I
know now where I had seen your eyes before. They were in the head of no
less a man than the great Nikolay Korchagin, with whom I once sat in the
same railway carriage for two days. I thought I should never forget the
chess eye after that, but I could not put a name to it when I saw it in
you. I beg your pardon,' he ended suddenly, resuming marmoreal attitude
in his chair.

'I have played the game from my childhood, and with good players,' said
Marlowe simply. 'It is an hereditary gift, if you can call it a gift. At
the University I was nearly as good as anybody there, and I gave most of
my brains to that and the OUDS and playing about generally. At Oxford,
as I dare say you know, inducements to amuse oneself at the expense of
one's education are endless, and encouraged by the authorities. Well,
one day toward the end of my last term, Dr Munro of Queen's, whom I had
never defeated, sent for me. He told me that I played a fairish game
of chess. I said it was very good of him to say so. Then he said, "They
tell me you hunt, too." I said, "Now and then." He asked, "Is there
anything else you can do?" "No," I said, not much liking the tone of the
conversation-the old man generally succeeded in putting people's backs
up. He grunted fiercely, and then told me that enquiries were being made
on behalf of a wealthy American man of business who wanted an English
secretary. Manderson was the name, he said. He seemed never to have
heard it before, which was quite possible, as he never opened a
newspaper and had not slept a night outside the college for thirty
years. If I could rub up my spelling-as the old gentleman put it--I
might have a good chance for the post, as chess and riding and an Oxford
education were the only indispensable points.

'Well, I became Manderson's secretary. For a long time I liked the
position greatly. When one is attached to an active American plutocrat
in the prime of life one need not have many dull moments. Besides, it
made me independent. My father had some serious business reverses about
that time, and I was glad to be able to do without an allowance from
him. At the end of the first year Manderson doubled my salary. "It's