“He does not look like a creditor,” observed Hedges, with a fatherly air.  “Quite superior to that:  more like a parson.  It’s his manner that makes one doubt.  There was a mystery about it at Hartledon that I didn’t like; and he refused to give his name.  His insisting on seeing your lordship now, at dinner or not at dinner, is odd too; his voice is quiet, just as if he possessed the right to do this.  I didn’t know what to do, and as I say, he’s in the hall.”

“Show him in somewhere, Hedges.  Lady Hartledon is in the drawing-room, I suppose:  let him go into the dining-room.”

“Her ladyship’s dinner is being laid there, my lord,” dissented the cautious retainer.  “She said it was to be served as soon as it was ready, having come home earlier than she expected.”

“Deuce take it!” testily responded Val, “one can’t swing a cat in these cramped hired houses.  Show him into my smoking-den upstairs.”

“Let me go there,” said Mr. Carr, “and you can see him in this room.”

“No; keep to your wine, Carr.  Take him up there, Hedges.”

The butler retired, and Lord Hartledon turned to his guest.  “Carr, can you give a guess at the fellow’s business?”

“It’s nothing to trouble you.  If you have overlooked any old debt, you are able to give a cheque for it.  But I should rather suspect your persevering friend to be some clergyman or missionary, bent on drawing a good subscription from you.”

Val did not raise his eyes.  He was playing again with his empty wine-glass, his face grave and perplexed.

“Do they serve writs in these cases?” he suddenly asked.

Mr. Carr laughed.  “Is the time so long gone by that you have forgotten yours?  You have had some in your day.”

“I am not thinking of debt, Carr:  that is over for me.  But there’s no denying that I behaved disgracefully to—­you know—­and Dr. Ashton has good reason to be incensed.  Can he be bringing an action against me, and is this visit in any way connected with it?”

“Nonsense,” said Mr. Carr.

“Is it nonsense!  I’m sure I’ve heard of their dressing-up these serving-officers as clergymen, to entrap the unwary.  Well, call it nonsense, if you like.  What of my suggestion in regard to Dr. Ashton?”

Thomas Carr paused to consider.  That it was most improbable in all respects, he felt sure; next door to impossible.

“The doctor is too respectable a man to do anything of the sort,” he answered.  “He is high-minded, honourable, wealthy:  there’s no inducement whatever. No.”

“Yes, there may be one:  that of punishing me by bringing my disgrace before the world.”

“You forget that he would bring his daughter’s name before it at the same time.  It is quite out of the range of possibility.  The Ashtons are not people to seek legal reparation for injury of this sort.  But that your fears are blinding you, you would never suspect them of being capable of it.”