expected us to be unusually hungry, but he had certainly taken pains to order a delightful lunch and to prove to us that he had a very nice and critical taste in champagne. And all the time we were lunching he kept the waiters in the room, artfully, I thought, lest Madrasia should open out on the subject uppermost in our thoughts; true, he talked freely himself, but it was all about a play that he had seen at the Theatre Royal on the previous evening, and of which he was enthusiastically full.
"But you shall see it yourself to-night," he wound up. "I've booked two seats—Craye shall take you."
"And—you?" asked Madrasia. "Won't it bear seeing twice in succession?"
"I've some business," he answered. "I shall be out when you return; we'll compare notes in the morning."
I saw that Madrasia was dying to ask him what his business was, but the waiters were still in the room. It was not until they had served us with coffee and gone away for good that Parslewe came to what we certainly regarded as business. Giving me a cigar and
