“Why not, sir—­if you prefer it?” he rejoined.  “Pray proceed.”

The Prophet’s face was flushed, either by the “creaming foam,” or by irritation, or by both.

“Surely,” he began, in a choking voice, “surely the stars are the same whether they are looked at from Berkeley Square or from—­from—­or from”—­he sought passionately for a violent contrast—­“from Newington Butts,” he concluded triumphantly.

“I have not the pleasure to have ever observed my guides from the neighbourhood of the Butts,” said Malkiel, serenely.  “But pray proceed, sir.  I am all attention.  You cast your honoured grandmother’s horoscope—­in the Berkeley Square.”

The Prophet seized his glass, but some remnants of his tattered self-control still clung to him, and he put it down without seeking further madness from its contents.

“I did,” he said firmly, even obstinately.  “And I discovered—­I say discovered that she was going to have an accident while on an evening expedition—­or jaunt as you might perhaps prefer to call it.”

“I should certainly call it so—­in the case of a lady who was an honoured grandmother,” said Malkiel the Second in assent.

“Well, Malkiel the Second,” continued the Prophet, recovering his composure as he approached his coup, “my grandmother did have an accident, as I foretold.”

“Did she have it in the square, sir?” asked Malkiel.

“And what if she did?” cried the Prophet with considerable testiness.

He was beginning to conceive a perfect hatred of the admirable neighbourhood, which he had loved so well.

“I merely ask for information, sir.”

“The accident did take place in the square certainly, and on the very night for which I predicted it.”

Malkiel the Second looked very thoughtful, even morose.  He poured out another glass of champagne, drank it slowly in sips, and when the glass was empty ran the forefinger of his right hand slowly round and round its edge.

“Can Madame be wrong?” he ejaculated at length, in a muffled voice of meditation.  “Can Madame be wrong?”

The Prophet gazed at him with profound curiosity, fascinated by the circular movement of the yellow dogskin finger, and by the inward murmur—­so acutely mental—­that accompanied it.

“Madame?” whispered the Prophet, drawing his cane chair noiselessly forward.

“Ah!” rejoined Malkiel, gazing upon him with an eye whose pupil seemed suddenly dilated to a most preternatural size.  “Can she have been wrong all these many years?”

“What—­what about?” murmured the Prophet.

Malkiel the Second leaned his matted head in his hands and replied, as if to himself,—­

“Can it be that a prophet should live in Berkeley Square—­not Kimmins’s”—­here he raised his head, and raked his companion with a glance that was almost fierce in its fervour of inquiry—­“not Kimmins’s but—­the Berkeley Square?”