“When will that be?” she asked.

Jaffery seemed to be as vague as myself.

“Is it in the printer’s hands?”

“Not yet.”

“Why?”

He explained that Adrian had practically finished the novel; but here and there it needed the little trimming and tacking together, which Adrian would have done had he lived to revise the manuscript.  He himself was engaged on this necessary though purely mechanical task of revision.

“I quite agree,” said Doria to this, “that Adrian’s work could not be given out in an imperfect state.  But there can’t be very much to do, so why are you taking all this time over it?”

“I’m afraid I’ve been rather busy,” said he.

Which tactless, though I admit unavoidable, reply did not greatly please Doria.  When she saw Barbara, to whom she related this conversation, she complained of Jaffery’s unfeeling conduct.  He had no right to hang up Adrian’s great novel on account of his own wretched business.  Letting the latter slide would have been a tribute to his dead friend.  Barbara did her best to soothe her; but we agreed that Jaffery had made a bad start.

A short while afterwards I was in the club again and there I came across Arbuthnot, the manager of Jaffery’s newspaper, whom I had known for some years—­originally I think through Jaffery.  I accepted the offer of a seat at his luncheon table, and, as men will, we began to discuss our common friend.

“I wonder what has come over him lately,” said he after a while.

“Have you noticed any difference?” I was startled.

“Yes.  Can’t make him out.”

“Poor Adrian Boldero’s death was a great shock.”

“Quite so,” Arbuthnot assented.  “But Jaff Chayne, when he gets a shock, is the sort of fellow that goes into the middle of a wilderness and roars.  Yet here he is in London and won’t be persuaded to leave it.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“We wanted to send him out to Persia, and he refused to go.  We had to send young Brodie instead, who won’t do the work half as well.”

“All this is news to me,” said I.

“And it was a first-class business with armed escorts, caravans, wild tribes—­a matter of great danger and subtle politics—­railways, finance—­the whole hang of the international situation and internal conditions—­a big scoop—­everything that usually is butter and honey to Jaff Chayne—­an ideal job for him in every way.  But no.  He was fed up with scalliwagging all over the place.  He wanted a season in town!”

At the idea of Jaffery yearning to play the Society butterfly I could not help laughing.  Jaffery lounging down Bond Street in immaculate vesture!  Jaffery sipping tea at afternoon At Homes!  Jaffery dancing till three o’clock in the morning!  It was all very comic, and Arbuthnot seeing the matter in that aspect laughed too.  But, on the other hand, it was all very incomprehensible.  To Jaffery