“There is Crowfoot,” said Spargo.  “Shout him over here, Starkey, before anybody else collars him.”

Through the door by which Spargo had entered a few minutes previously came a man who stood for a moment blinking at the smoke and the lights.  He was a tall, elderly man with a figure and bearing of a soldier; a big, sweeping moustache stood well out against a square-cut jaw and beneath a prominent nose; a pair of keen blue eyes looked out from beneath a tousled mass of crinkled hair.  He wore neither hat nor cap; his attire was a carelessly put on Norfolk suit of brown tweed; he looked half-unkempt, half-groomed.  But knotted at the collar of his flannel shirt were the colours of one of the most famous and exclusive cricket clubs in the world, and everybody knew that in his day their wearer had been a mighty figure in the public eye.

“Hi, Crowfoot!” shouted Starkey above the din and babel.  “Crowfoot, Crowfoot!  Come over here, there’s a chap dying to see you!”

“Yes, that’s the way to get him, isn’t it?” said Spargo.  “Here, I’ll get him myself.”

He went across the room and accosted the old sporting journalist.

“I want a quiet word with you,” he said.  “This place is like a pandemonium.”

Crowfoot led the way into a side alcove and ordered a drink.

“Always is, this time,” he said, yawning.  “But it’s companionable.  What is it, Spargo?”

Spargo took a pull at the glass which he had carried with him.  “I should say,” he said, “that you know as much about sporting matters as any man writing about ’em?”

“Well, I think you might say it with truth,” answered Crowfoot.

“And old sporting matters?” said Spargo.

“Yes, and old sporting matters,” replied the other with a sudden flash of the eye.  “Not that they greatly interest the modern generation, you know.”

“Well, there’s something that’s interesting me greatly just now, anyway,” said Spargo.  “And I believe it’s got to do with old sporting affairs.  And I came to you for information about it, believing you to be the only man I know of that could tell anything.”

“Yes—­what is it?” asked Crowfoot.

Spargo drew out an envelope, and took from it the carefully-wrapped-up silver ticket.  He took off the wrappings and laid the ticket on Crowfoot’s outstretched palm.

“Can you tell me what that is?” he asked.

Another sudden flash came into the old sportsman’s eyes—­he eagerly turned the silver ticket over.

“God bless my soul!” he exclaimed.  “Where did you get this?”

“Never mind, just now,” replied Spargo.  “You know what it is?”

“Certainly I know what it is!  But—­Gad!  I’ve not seen one of these things for Lord knows how many years.  It makes me feel something like a young ’un again!” said Crowfoot.  “Quite a young ’un!”

“But what is it?” asked Spargo.

Crowfoot turned the ticket over, showing the side on which the heraldic device was almost worn away.