“Why, I’m giving myself a rest this morning, sir!” he declared.  “I haven’t troubled to tell you more than the bare facts.  This house doesn’t need any talking about—­doesn’t need a word said about it.  Her Ladyship’s last words to us were—­Lady Idlemay, you know, the owner of the house—­’Mr. Waddington and Mr. Burton,’ she said—­she was speaking to us both, for the governor always introduces me to clients as being the one who does most of the letting,—­’Mr. Waddington and Mr. Burton,’ she said, ’if a tenant comes along whom you think I’d like to have living in my rooms and using my furniture, breathing my air, so to speak, why, go ahead and let the house, rents being shockingly low just now, with agricultural depression and what not, but sooner than not let it to gentlepeople, I’ll do without the money,’ Her Ladyship declared.  Now you’re just the sort of tenant she’d like to have here.  I’m quite sure of that, Mr. Lynn.  I should take a pleasure in bringing you two together.”

Mr. Lynn grunted.  He was perfectly well aware that the house would seem more desirable to his wife and daughters from the very fact that it belonged to a “Lady” anybody.  He was perfectly well aware, also, that his companion had suspected this.  The consideration of these facts left him, however, unaffected.  He was disposed, if anything, to admire the cleverness of the young man who had realized an outside asset.

“Well, I’ve seen pretty well all over it,” he remarked.  “I’ll go back to the office with you, anyhow, and have a word with Mr. Waddington.  By the way, what’s that room behind you?”

The young man glanced carelessly around at the door of the room of Fate and down at the bunch of keys which he held in his hand.  He even chuckled as he replied.

“I was going to mention the matter of that room, sir,” he replied, “because, if perfectly agreeable to the tenant, Her Ladyship would like to keep it locked up.”

“Locked up?” Mr. Lynn repeated.  “And why?”

“Regular queer story, sir,” the young man declared, confidentially.  “The late Earl was a great traveller in the East, as you may have heard, and he was always poking about in some ruined city or other in the desert, and picking up things and making discoveries.  Well, last time he came home from abroad, he brought with him an old Egyptian or Arab,—­I don’t know which he was, but he was brown,—­settled him down in this room—­in his own house, mind—­and wouldn’t have him disturbed or interfered with, not at any price.  Well, the old chap worked here night and day at some sort of writing, and then, naturally enough, what with not having the sort of grub he liked, and never going outside the doors, he croaked.”

“He what?” Mr. Lynn interposed.

“He died,” the young man explained.  “It was just about the time that the Earl was ill himself.  His Lordship gave orders that the body was to be buried and the room locked up, in case the old chap’s heirs should come along.  Seems he’d brought a few odd things of his own over—­nothing whatever of any value.  Anyway, those were Lord Idlemay’s wishes, and the room has been locked up ever since.”