d by him.

They left the office together frequently, now; they often lunched
uptown. Whether they were in each other's company evenings, Selwyn did
not know, for Gerald no longer volunteered information as to his
whereabouts or doings. And all this hurt Selwyn, and alarmed him, too,
for he was slowly coming to the conclusion that he did not like
Neergard, that he would never sign articles of partnership with him, and
that even his formal associateship with the company was too close a
relation for his own peace of mind. But on Gerald's account he stayed
on; he did not like to leave the boy alone for his sister's sake as well
as for his own.

Matters drifted that way through early spring. He actually grew to
dislike both Neergard and the business of Neergard & Co.--for no one
particular reason, perhaps, but in general; though he did not yet care
to ask himself to be more precise in his unuttered criticisms.

However, detail and routine, the simpler alphabet of the business,
continued to occupy him. He consulted both Neergard and Gerald as usual;
they often consulted him or pretended to do so. Land was bought and
sold and resold, new projects discussed, new properties appraised, new
mortgage loans negotiated; and solely because of his desire to remain
near Gerald, this sort of thing might have continued indefinitely. But
Neergard broke his word to him.

And one morning, before he left his rooms at Mrs. Greeve's lodgings to
go downtown, Percy Draymore called him up on the telephone; and as that
overfed young man's usual rising hour was notoriously nearer noon than
eight o'clock, it surprised Selwyn to be asked to remain in his rooms
for a little while until Draymore and one or two friends could call on
him personally concerning a matter of importance.

He therefore breakfasted leisurely; and he was still scanning the real
estate columns of a morning paper when Mrs. Greeve came panting to his
door and ushered in a file of rather sleepy but important looking
gentlemen, evidently unaccustomed to being abroad so early, and bored to
death with their experience.

They were men he knew only formally, or, at best, merely as fellow club
members; men whom he met when a dance or dinner took him out of the less
pretentious sets he personally affected; men whom the newspapers and the
public knew too well to speak of as "well known."

First there was Percy Draymore, overgroomed for a gentleman, fat,
good-humoured, and fashionable