Speedwell, sub-editor of the Minute, buttonholed him one day at the club, and led him into a corner.

“You are the very man I wanted to see, Jesson,” he exclaimed.  “Have a drink?”

“I’ve just dined, thanks,” Douglas answered.  “What can I do for you?”

“I’m giving some space in my rag,” Speedwell explained, blandly, “to a series of memoirs on prominent journalists of the day, and I want to include you.”

“I’m sure you’re very kind,” Douglas answered, “but you can’t be in earnest.  To begin with, I’m not a prominent journalist, and I don’t suppose I ever shall be—­”

“Well, you’re a bit of a miracle, you know,” Speedwell interrupted.  “You’ve come to the front so quickly, and you’ve a method of your own—­the staccato, nervous style, you know, with lots of colour and dashes.  I wish I’d a man on the staff who could do it.  Still, that’s neither here nor there, and you needn’t think I’m hinting, for I tell you frankly the Minute can’t afford large-salaried men.  What I want from you is a photograph, and just a little sketch of your early life—­where you were born, and where you went to school, and that sort of thing.  It mayn’t do you much good, but it can’t do you any harm, and I’ll be awfully obliged.”

Douglas was silent for a moment.  The whole panorama of that joyless youth of his seemed suddenly stretched out before him.  He saw himself as boy, and youth, and man; the village school changed into the sectarian university, where the great highroad to knowledge was rank with the weeds of prejudice.  He saw himself back again at the farmhouse, he felt again the vague throbbings of that discontent which had culminated in a tragedy.  He was suddenly white almost to the lips, a mist seemed to hang about the room, and the cheerful voices of the men playing pool came to him like a dirge from the far distance.  Speedwell, waiting in vain for his answer, looked at him in surprise.

“Aren’t you well, old chap?” he asked.  “You look as though you’d seen a ghost.”

Douglas pulled himself together with an effort.

“I’m not quite the thing,” he said.  “Late, last night, I suppose.  I’m sure it’s very good of you to think of me, Speedwell, but I’d rather you left me out.”

“Why?”

“You see I’m really only a novice—­quite a beginner, and I don’t feel I’ve the right to be included.”

“That” Speedwell answered, “is our business.  You didn’t come to us—­I came to you.  All you have to do is to answer a few questions, and let me have that photo.”

Douglas shook his head.

“You must please excuse me, Speedwell,” he said.  “It’s very kind of you, but to tell you the truth, there are certain painful incidents in connection with my life before I came to London which I am anxious to forget.  I do not choose to have a past at all.”

Speedwell shrugged his shoulders and lit a cigarette.  He was none too well pleased.