“You know,” he said, “this is an education.  In my innocence I thought that a burglar shoved his swag in a sack and then pushed off, and did the rest in the back parlour of a beer-house in Notting Dale.  As it is, my only wonder is that you didn’t bring a brazier and a couple of melting-pots.”

“Not my job,” was the reply.  “I’m not a receiver.  Besides, you don’t think that all this beautiful silver is to be broken up?” The horror of his uplifted hands would have been more convincing if both of them had been empty.  “Why, in a very little while, particularly if you travel, you will have every opportunity of buying It back again in open market.”

“But how comic,” said Berry.  “I should think you’re a favourite at Lloyd’s.  D’you mind if I blow my nose?  Or would that be a casus belli?”

“Not at all”—­urbanely.  “Indeed, if you would care to give me your word....”

Berry shook his head.

“Honour among thieves?” he said.  “Unfortunately I’m honest, so you must have no truck with me.  Never mind.  D’you touch cards at all?  Or only at Epsom?”

Beneath the green mask the mouth tightened, and I could see that the taunt had gone home.  No man likes to be whipped before his underlings.

Nobby profited by the master’s silence, and had devoured two more chocolates before Berry spoke again—­this time to me.

“Gentleman seems annoyed,” he remarked.  “I do hope he hasn’t misconstrued anything I’ve said.  D’you think we ought to offer him breakfast?  Of course, five is rather a lot, but I dare say one of them is a vegetarian, and you can pretend you don’t care for haddock.  Or they may have some tripe downstairs.  You never know.  And afterwards we could run them back to Limehouse.  By the way, I wonder if I ought to tell him about the silver which-not.  It’s only nickel, but I don’t want to keep anything back.  Oh, and what about the dividend warrant?  Of course it wants riveting and—­er—­forging, and I don’t think they’d recognize it, but he could try.  If I die before he goes, ask him to leave his address; then, if he leaves anything behind, the butler can send it on.  I remember I left a pair of bed-socks once at Chatsworth.  The Duke never sent them on, but then they were perishable.  Besides, one of them followed me as far as Leicester.  Instinct, you know.  I wrote to The Field about it.”  He paused to shift uneasily in his seat.  “You know, if I have to sustain this pose much longer, I shall get railway spine or a hare lip or something.”

“Hush,” said I.  “What did Alfred Austin say in 1895?”

“I know,” said Berry. “’Comrades, leave me here a little, while as yet ‘tis early morn.’  Precisely.  But then all his best work was admittedly done under the eiderdown.”

The clock upon the wall was chiming the hour.  Two o’clock.

Would Jonah never come?

I fancy the same query renewed its hammering at Berry’s brain, for, after a moment’s reflection, he turned to the master.