a cold
look. So much more quickly does the heart influence than the head, even
with the very cleverest amongst us.

As Layton entered the dining-room, his host rose to receive him, and,
with a polished courtesy, apologized for having gone to table before his
arrival. "I gave you half an hour, doctor, and I would have given you
longer, but that I am aware a physician is not always master of his
time. Colonel Karstairs you are acquainted with. Let me present you to
Mr. Ogden. Dr. Layton, Mr. Ogden."

There is no manner that so impresses the world with the idea of
self-sufficiency and pretension as that of the bashful man contending
against his own diffidence; and this same timidity, that one would
imagine so easily rubbed off by contact with the world, actually
increases with age, and, however glossed over by an assumed ease and a
seeming indifference, lives to torment its possessor to his last day.
Of this Layton was an unhappy victim, and while imbued with a consummate
self-esteem, he had a painful consciousness of the criticism that his
manner and breeding might call forth. The result of this conflict was to
render him stern, defiant, and even overbearing,--traits which
imparted their character even to his features in first intercourse with
strangers.

"I don't know how Halford managed it," said Mr. Ogden, as he reseated
himself at table, "but I 've heard him say that his professional
engagements never lost him a dinner."

Simple as were these words, they contained a rebuke, and the air of the
man that uttered them did not diminish their significance.

Mr. Ogden was a thin, pale, pock-marked man, with an upstanding head
of gray hair, a very high and retreating forehead, and a long upper
lip,--one of those men in whom the face, disproportionately large for
the head, always gives the impression of a self-sufficient nature.
He had a harsh, sharp voice, with an articulation of a most painful
accuracy, even his commonplaces being enunciated with a sort of distinct
impressiveness, as though to imply that his copper was of more value
than another man's gold. Nor was this altogether a delusion; he had had
a considerable experience of mankind and the world, and had contrived to
pass his bad money on them as excellent coin of the realm. He was--and
it is very distinctive in its mark--one of those men who always live
in a class above their own, and, whatever be the recognition and the
acceptance they have there, are ever re