ers insisted that
he was sinister-looking and cruel. Which were right I shall not
undertake to say. Whether it was a lion or a snake in him that
fascinated, it is certainly true that he impressed every one who knew
him. In some respects his influence was very singular. He seemed to
throw out a strange devitalizing force that acted as well upon inanimate
as upon animate things. The new buffet had not been in the dining-room
six months before it looked as ancient as the Louis XIV. pier-glass in
the upper hall. This subtle influence of Mr. Maddledock had wrought a
curious effect upon the whole house. It oxydized the frescoes on the
walls. It subdued the varied shades of color that streamed in from the
stained-glass windows. It gave a deeper richness to the velvet carpets
and mellowed the lace curtains that hung from the parlor casements into
a creamy tint.

[Illustration: "IN THE MORGUE," SAID MR. MADDLEDOCK, "WELL, THAT'S THE
BEST PLACE FOR HIM."]

Mr. Maddledock's figure was faultless. From head to heels he was
adjusted with mathematical nicety. Every organ in his shapely body did
its work silently, easily, accurately. Silver-gray hair covered his
head, falling gracefully away from a parting in the middle of it. It
never seemed to grow long, and yet it never looked as if it had been
cut. Mr. Maddledock's eyes were his most striking feature. Absolutely
unaffected by either glare or shadow, neither dilating nor contracting,
they remained ever clear, large, gray, and cold. No mark or line in his
face indicated care or any of the burdens that usually depress and
trouble men. If such things were felt in his experience their force was
spent long before they had contrived to mar his unruffled countenance.
Though the house had tumbled before his eyes, by not a single vibration
would his complacent voice have been intensified. He never suffered his
feelings to escape his control. Occasionally, to be sure, he might curl
his lip, or lift his eyebrows, or depress the corners of his mouth. When
deeply moved he might go so far as to diffuse a nipping frost around
him, but no angry words ever fell from his lips.

Five, seven, ten, fifteen, twenty minutes had passed since the hall
clock had sounded the hour and Wobbles's temperature had risen to the
degree which borders on apoplexy. What might have happened is dreadful
to conjecture had not Dinks, the housekeeper, come to his relief with
the sagacious counsel that he wait no longer,