century, and looked as if it had never been papered or painted since Queen Mary’s time.  But it was near the collieries; and within its blackened walls, and among its bleak fields and grimy trees, Lord Restalrig chose to live alone, with an old man and an old woman for his attendants.  The woman had been his nurse; it was whispered in the district that she was also his illegal-aunt, or perhaps even, so to speak, his illegal stepmother.  At all events, she endured more than anybody but a Scotch woman who had been his nurse in childhood would have tolerated.  To keep her in his service saved him the cost of a pension, which even the marquis, people thought, could hardly refuse to allow her.  The other old servitor was her husband, and entirely under her domination.  Both might be reckoned staunch, in the old fashion, ‘to the name,’ which Logan only bore by accident, his grandmother having wedded a kinless Logan who had no demonstrable connection with the house of Restalrig.  Any mortal but the marquis would probably have brought Logan up as his heir, for the churlish peer had no nearer connection.  But the marquis did more than sympathise with the Roman emperor who quoted ‘after me the Last Day.’  The emperor only meant that, after his time, he did not care how soon earth and fire were mingled.  The marquis, on the other hand, gave the impression that, he once out of the way, he ardently desired the destruction of the whole human race.  He was not known ever to have consciously benefited man or woman.  He screwed out what he might from everybody in his power, and made no returns which the law did not exact; even these, as far as the income tax went, he kept at the lowest figure possible.

Such was the distinguished personage whose card was handed to Merton one morning at the office.  There had been no previous exchange of letters, according to the rules of the Society, and yet Merton could not suppose that the marquis wished to see him on any but business matters.  ’He wants to put a spoke in somebody’s wheel,’ thought Merton, ‘but whose?’

He hastily scrawled a note for Logan, who, as usual, was late, put it in an envelope, and sealed it.  He wrote:  ’On no account come in. Explanation later!  Then he gave the note to the office boy, impressed on him the necessity of placing it in Logan’s hands when he arrived, and told the boy to admit the visitor.

The marquis entered, clad in rusty black not unlike a Scotch peasant’s best raiment as worn at funerals.  He held a dripping umbrella; his boots were muddy, his trousers had their frayed ends turned up.  He wore a hard, cruel red face, with keen grey eyes beneath penthouses where age had touched the original tawny red with snow.  Merton, bowing, took the umbrella and placed it in a stand.

‘You’ll not have any snuff?’ asked the marquis.