"but I'm not going to let him
cheat me again."

A buzz of voices issued from a partly opened door on the first floor,
and Andrew walked straight in without hesitation, Frank finding himself
in the presence of about twenty gentlemen, standing at one end of a long
room, along whose sides were arranged small tables laid for dinner.

The conversation stopped on the instant, and every eye was turned toward
the new-comers, who doffed their hats with the customary formal bows,
when, to the great relief of Frank, one gentleman detached himself from
the group and came to meet them.

"How are you, Mr Selby?" said Andrew loudly.

"The happier for seeing you keep your engagement," said their friend the
feeder of ducks, smiling. "Mr Gowan, I am delighted to find my prayer
has not been vain. Let me introduce you to our friends here of the
club. We look upon this as a home, where we are all perfectly at our
ease; and we wish our visitors--our neophytes--to feel the same.
Gentlemen, let me introduce my guest, Mr Frank Gowan. I think some of
you have heard his father's--Sir Robert Gowan's--name."

There was a warm murmur of assent, and to a man the party assembled
pressed forward to bid the visitors welcome. So pleasantly warm was the
reception given to him, and so genuine the efforts made to set him at
his ease, that the lad's feeling of diffidence and confusion soon began
to pass away, and with it the feeling of uneasiness; for the boy felt
that these gentlemen could not have been of the party engaged in the
riot, and he had nearly persuaded himself that, as this was evidently a
public tavern, quite another class of people had occupied the room on
his previous visit to the place, only he could not make this explanation
fit with Andrew's excitement and desire to join in the fight.

But he had little time for thought. His bland and pleasant-spoken host
took up too much of his attention, chatting fluently about the most
matter-of-fact occurrences, political business being entirely excluded,
and cleverly drawing the lads out in turn to talk about themselves and
their aspirations, so ably, indeed, that before the agreeable little
dinner served to these three at a table close to the window was half
over, Frank found that he was relating some of his country life and
school adventures to his host, and that the gentlemen at the tables on
either side were listening.

The knowledge that he was being overheard acted as an extinguishe