Dinner surprised him by being so pleasantly homely.  A single trim maidservant waited upon them, a man at the sideboard opened the wine, carved, and vanished early in the repast.  Over a great bowl of clustering roses he could see her within a few feet of him, plainly dressed in black lace with a band of velvet around her white neck, her eyes resting often upon him full of gentle sympathy.  They talked of the books they had been looking at, a conversation all the while without background or foreground.  Only once she lifted her glass, which had just been filled, and looked across to him.

“To the city—­beautiful,” she said softly.  “May the day soon come when you shall write of it—­and forget!”

He drank the toast fervently.  But of the future then he found it hard to think.  The transition to this from his days of misery had been too sudden.  As yet his sense of proportion had not had time to adjust itself.  Behind him were nameless horrors—­that he had a future at all was a fact which he had only recognised during the last few hours.

Afterwards they sat in low chairs on a terrace with coffee on a small round table between them, a fountain playing beneath, beyond, the trees of the park, the countless lights of the streets, and the gleaming fires of innumerable hansoms.  It was the London of broad streets, opulent, dignified, afire for pleasure.  Women were whirled by, bright-eyed, bejewelled, softly clad in white feathers and opera cloaks; men hatless, immaculate as regards shirt-fronts and ties, well-groomed, the best of their race.  Wonderful sight for Douglas, fresh from the farmhouse amongst the hills, the Scotch college, the poverty-stricken seminary.  Back went his thoughts to that dreary past, and though the night was hot he shivered.  She looked at him curiously.

“You are cold?”

He shook his head.

“I was thinking,” he answered.

She laid her fingers upon his arm, a touch so thrilling and yet so delicate.

“Don’t you know,” she said, “that of all philosophies the essence is to command one’s thoughts, to brush away the immaterial, the unworthy, the unhappy.  Try and think that life starts with you from to-day.  You are one of those few, those very few people, Douglas Jesson, who have before them a future.  Try and keep yourself master of it.”

A servant stepped out on to the balcony and stood respectfully before them.  She looked up frowning.

“What is it, Mason?” she asked.  “I told you that I was not seeing any one at all to-night.”

“The person, madame,” he answered, “is from Scotland Yard, and he says that his business is most important.  He has called twice before.  He begged me to give you his card, and to say that he will wait until you can find it convenient to spare him a few minutes.”  She looked at the card—­

“Mr. Richard Grey,
   from Scotland Yard.”

Then she rose regretfully.