and comfort less allied to glitter
and tinsel.

This was Carr's Club.

The unknown sat down before the visitor's book, and began to write his
own name and the name of his guest.

Jones, looking over his shoulder, saw that his name was Spence, Patrick
Spence. Sir Patrick Spence, for one of the attendants addressed him as
Sir Patrick. A mixed grill, some cheese and draught beer in heavy pewter
tankards, constituted the meal, during which the loquacious Spence kept
up the conversation.

"I don't want to poke my nose into your affairs," said he, "but I can
see there's something worrying you; you're not the same chap. Is it
about the wife?"

"No," said Jones, "it's not that."

"Well, I don't want to dig into your confidences, and I don't want to
give you advice. If I did, I'd say make it up with her. You know very
well, Rochy, you have led her the deuce of a dance. Your sister got me
on about it the other night at the Vernons'. We had a long talk about
you, Rochy, and we agreed you were the best of chaps, but too much given
to gaiety and promiscuous larks. You should have heard me holding forth.
But, joking apart, it's time you and I settled down, old chap. You can't
put old heads on young shoulders, but our shoulders ain't so young as
they used to be, Rochy. And I want to tell you this, if you don't hitch
up again in harness, the other party will do a bolt. I'm dead serious.
It's not the thing to say to another man, but you and I haven't any
secrets between us, and we've always been pretty plain one to the
other--well, this is what I want to say, and just take it as it's meant.
Maniloff is after her. You know that chap, the _attache_ at the Russian
Embassy, chap like a billiard marker, always at the other end of a
cigarette--other name's Boris. Hasn't a penny to bless himself with. I
know he hasn't, for I've made kind enquiries about him through Lewis,
reason why--he wanted to buy one of my racers for export to Roosia.
Seven hundred down and the balance in six months. Lewis served up his
past to me on a charger. The chap's rotten with debt, divorced from his
wife, and a punter at Monte Carlo. That's his real profession, and card
playing. He's a sleepy Slav, and if he was told his house was on fire
he'd say, "nichevo," meaning it don't matter, it's well insured--if he
had a house to insure, which he hasn't. But women like him, he's that
sort. But Heaven help the woman that marries him. He'd take her money
and herself