He was perhaps somewhat puffed up by his success.  He was certainly proud of the position he had made.  He liked to see his wife sweep along the streets in her fine robes of Indian silk, which seemed to set a great gulf between her and her neighbours.  He allowed his son to copy the fopperies of the Court gallants, and even to pick up the silly French phrases which made the language at Court a mongrel mixture of bad English and vile French.  All these things pleased him well, although he himself went about clad in much the same fashion as his neighbours, save that the materials of his clothing were finer, and his frills more white and crisp; and it was in his favour that his friendship with his old friend James Harmer had never waned, although he knew that this honest tradesman by no means approved his methods.

Perhaps in his heart of hearts he preferred the comfortable living room of his neighbour to the grandeur insisted upon by his wife at home.  At any rate, he found his way three or four evenings in the week to Harmer’s fireside, and exchanged with him the news of the day, or retailed the current gossip of the city.

Harmer was by trade a gold and silver lace maker.  He carried on his business in the roomy bridge house which he occupied, which was many stories high, and contained a great number of rooms.  He housed in it a large family, several apprentices, two shopmen, and his wife’s sister, Dinah Morse, at such times as the latter was not out nursing the sick, which was her avocation in life.

Mason and Harmer had been boys together, had inherited these two houses on the bridge from their respective fathers, and had both prospered in the world.  But Harmer was only a moderately affluent man, having many sons and daughters to provide for; whereas Mason had but one of each, and had more than one string to his bow in the matter of money getting.

In the living room of Harmer’s house were assembled that February evening six persons.  It was just growing dusk, but the dancing firelight gave a pleasant illumination.  Harmer and Mason were seated on opposite sides of the hearth in straight-backed wooden armchairs, and both were smoking.  Rachel sat at her wheel, with her sister Dinah near to her; and in the background hovered two fine-looking young men, the two eldest sons of the household—­Reuben, his father’s right-hand man in business matters now; and Dan, who had the air and appearance of a sailor ashore, as, indeed, was the case with him.

It was something which Dinah Morse had said that had evoked the rather fierce disclaimer from the Master Builder, with the rejoinder by Rachel as to the laxity of the times; and now it was Dinah’s voice which again took up the word.

“Whether it be God’s judgment upon the city, or whether it be due to the carelessness of man, I know not,” answered Dinah quietly; “I only say that the Bill of Mortality just published is higher than it has been this long while, and that two in the Parish of St. Giles have died of the plague.”