But for a month or more, until this S. O. S. call comes in, he don’t show up at all.  So I’m some curious myself to know just what’s struck him.  I must say, though, that for a party who’s been crossed off the dividend list for more’n a year, he’s chuckin’ a good bluff.  Some spiffy bachelor apartments these are that I locates—­tubbed bay trees out front, tapestry panels in the reception-room, and a doorman uniformed like a rear-admiral.  I has to tell the ’phone girl who I am and why, and get an upstairs O. K., before I’m passed on to the elevator.  Also my ring at B suite, third floor, is answered by a perfectly good valet.

“From Mr. Ellins, sir?” says he, openin’ the door a crack.

“Straight,” says I.

He swings it wide and bows respectful.  A classy party, this man of Mr. Adams’, too.  Nothing down-and-out about him.  Tuxedo, white tie, and neat trimmed siders in front of his ears.  One of these quiet spoken, sleuthy movin’ gents he is, a reg’lar stage valet.  But he manages to give me the once-over real thorough as he’s towin’ me in.

“This way, sir,” says he, brushin’ back the draperies and shuntin’ me in among the leather chairs and Oriental rugs.

Standin’ in the middle of the room, with his feet wide apart, is Mr. Adams, like he was waitin’ impatient.  You’d hardly call him sick abed.  I expect it would take a subway smash to dent him any.  But, if his man fails to look the part of better days gone by, Ham Adams is the true picture of a seedy sport.  His padded silk dressin’-gown is fringed along the cuffs, and one of the shoulder seams is split; his slippers are run over; and his shirt should have gone to the wash last week.  Also his chin is decorated in two places with surgeon’s tape and has a thick growth of stubble on it.  As I drifts in he’s makin’ a bum attempt to’ roll a cigarette and is gazin’ disgusted at the result.

“Why didn’t Bob come himself?” he demands peevish.

“Rush of business,” says I.  “He’d been takin’ time off and the work piled up on him.”

“Humph!” says Adams.  “Well, I’ve got to see him, that’s all.”

“In that case,” says I, “you ought to drop around about—­”

“Out of the question,” says he.  “Look at me.  Been trying to shave myself.  Besides—­ Well, I can’t!”

“Mr. Robert thought,” I goes on, “that you might—­”

“Well?” breaks in Mr. Adams, turnin’ his back on me sudden and glarin’ at the draperies.  “What is it, Nivens?”

At which the valet appears, holdin’ a bunch of roses.

“From Mrs. Grenville Hawks, sir,” says he.  “They came while you were at breakfast, sir.”

“Well, well, put them in a vase—­in there,” says Ham.  And as Nivens goes out he kicks the door to after him.

“Now, then,” he goes on, “what was it Mr. Robert thought?”

“That you might give me a line on how things stood with you,” says I, “so he’d know just what to do.”