did
not make myself clear. When I said that I thought nothing of him I meant
grammatically what I said. I meant that I did not think about him; that
he did not occupy my mind. You, however, seem to me to think a lot of
him, since you think him a knave. I should say he was glaringly good
myself."

"I sometimes think you talk paradox for its own sake," said Rupert,
breaking an egg with unnecessary sharpness. "What the deuce is the
sense of it? Here's a man whose original position was, by our common
agreement, dubious. He's a wanderer, a teller of tall tales, a man who
doesn't conceal his acquaintance with all the blackest and bloodiest
scenes on earth. We take the trouble to follow him to one of his
appointments, and if ever two human beings were plotting together and
lying to every one else, he and that impossible house-agent were doing
it. We followed him home, and the very same night he is in the thick
of a fatal, or nearly fatal, brawl, in which he is the only man armed.
Really, if this is being glaringly good, I must confess that the glare
does not dazzle me."

Basil was quite unmoved. "I admit his moral goodness is of a certain
kind, a quaint, perhaps a casual kind. He is very fond of change and
experiment. But all the points you so ingeniously make against him are
mere coincidence or special pleading. It's true he didn't want to talk
about his house business in front of us. No man would. It's true that he
carries a sword-stick. Any man might. It's true he drew it in the shock
of a street fight. Any man would. But there's nothing really dubious in
all this. There's nothing to confirm--"

As he spoke a knock came at the door.

"If you please, sir," said the landlady, with an alarmed air, "there's a
policeman wants to see you."

"Show him in," said Basil, amid the blank silence.

The heavy, handsome constable who appeared at the door spoke almost as
soon as he appeared there.

"I think one of you gentlemen," he said, curtly but respectfully, "was
present at the affair in Copper Street last night, and drew my attention
very strongly to a particular man."

Rupert half rose from his chair, with eyes like diamonds, but the
constable went on calmly, referring to a paper.

"A young man with grey hair. Had light grey clothes, very good, but torn
in the struggle. Gave his name as Drummond Keith."

"This is amusing," said Basil, laughing. "I was in the very act of
clearing that poor officer's character of rather