that fortress of gloom he had escaped with two saintly gifts somehow unspoiled: an inexhaustible kindness of heart, and a capacity for innocent gaiety which owed nothing to humour. In an earlier day and with a clerical training he might have risen to the scarlet hat. He was, in fact, a highly regarded member of the London Positivist Society, a retired banker, a widower without children. His austere but not unhappy life was spent largely among books and in museums; his profound and patiently accumulated knowledge of a number of curiously disconnected subjects which had stirred his interest at different times had given him a place in the quiet, half-lit world of professors and curators and devotees of research; at their amiable, unconvivial dinner parties he was most himself. His favourite author was Montaigne.
Just as Mr. Cupples was finishing his meal at a little table on the verandah, a big motor car turned into the drive before the hotel. 'Who is this?' he enquired of the waiter. 'Id is der manager,' said the young man listlessly. 'He have been to meed a gendleman by der train.'
The car drew up and the porter hurried from the entrance. Mr. Cupples uttered an exclama-
