He spoke without an accent and was most romantically dark.  Ellen wondered whether Mr. Philip would like him—­she had noticed that Mr. Philip didn’t seem to fancy people who were very tall.  And she perceived with consternation as they entered the room that he had suddenly been overtaken by one of his moods.  He had taken up the tray and was trying to slip it into the cupboard, which he might have seen would never hold it, and in any case was a queer place for a tray, and stood there with it in his hands, brick-red and glowering at them.  She was going to take it from him when he dunted it down on the window-seat with a clatter.  “What for can he not go on with his good chop?” thought Ellen.  “We’re putting on grand company manners for this bit chemist body, surely,” and she pulled forward a chair for the stranger and sat down in the corner with her note-book on her knee.

“You’re Mr. Yaverland?” said Mr. Philip, shooting his chin forward and squaring his shoulders, and looking as though his father were dead and he were the head of the firm.

“I’m Richard Yaverland.  Mr. Frank Gibson said you might be good enough to see to my affairs for me.  I’ve got a letter from him....”

Decidedly the man had an air.  He slid the letter across the table as if he did not care in the least whether anybody ever picked it up and retreated into a courteous inattention.  She felt a little cross at Mr. Philip for not showing that Edinburgh too understands the art of arrogance, for opening the letter so clumsily and omitting to say the nice friendly thing.  Well, if he was put about it was his own fault for not going on with the chop, it being well known to all educated persons that one cannot work on an empty stomach.  If this man would go soon she would run down to Mrs. Powell and get her to heat up the chop again.  She eyed him anxiously to see if he looked the kind of person who left when one wanted him to, and found herself liking him for the way he slouched in his chair, as though he wanted to mitigate as much as possible his terrifying strength and immensity.  What for did a fine man like him help to make cordite, the material of militarism, which is the curse of the nations?  She wished he could have heard R.J.  Campbell speak on peace the other night at the Synod Hall; it was fine.  But probably he was a Conservative, for these big men were often unprogressive.  She examined him carefully out of the corner of her eye to estimate the chances of his being brought into the fold of reform by properly selected oratory.  That at least was the character of contemplation she intended, but though she was so young that she believed the enjoyment of any sensory impression sheer waste unless it was popped into the mental stockpot and made the basis of some sustaining moral soup, she found herself just looking at him.  His black hair lay in streaks and rings on his rain-wet forehead and gave him an abandoned and magical air, like the ghost