“Dog kennel! dog kennel!” grumbled the polite Professor.  “Bare desolation like a damned dungeon.  You might as well live in the Sahara.”

“It would certainly be warmer,” replied Random, who knew the scientist’s snappy ways very well.  “Take a chair, sir!”

“Hard as bricks, confound it!  Hand me over a cushion.  There, that’s better!  No, I never drink between meals, thank you.  Smoke?  Hang it, Random, you should know by this time that I dislike making a chimney of my throat!  There! there! don’t fuss.  Take a seat and listen to what I have to say.  It’s important.  Poke the fire, please:  it’s cold.”

Random placidly did as he was told, and then lighted a cigar, as he sat down quietly.

“I am sorry to hear of your trouble, sir.’”

“Trouble! trouble!  What particular trouble?”

“The death of your assistant.”

“Oh yes.  Silly young ass to get killed.  Lost my mummy, too:  there’s trouble if you like.”

“The green mummy.”  Random looked into the fire, “Yes.  I have heard of the green mummy.”

“I should think you have,” snapped Braddock, warming his plump hands.  “Every penny-a-liner has been talking about it.  When did you return?”

“On the same day that that steamer with the mummy on board arrived,” was Random’s odd reply.

The Professor stared suspiciously.  “I don’t see why you should date your movements by my mummy,” he retorted.

“Well, I had a reason in doing so.”

“What reason?”

“The mummy—­”

“What about it?—­do you know where it is?” Braddock started to his feet, and looked eagerly at the calm face of his host.

“No, I wish I did.  How much did you pay for it, Professor?”

“What’s that to you?” snapped the other, resuming his seat.

“Nothing at all.  But it is a great deal to Don Pedro de Gayangos.”

“And who the deuce is he?  Some Spanish Egyptologist?”

“I don’t think he is an Egyptologist, sir.”

“He must be, if he wants my mummy.”

“You forget, Professor, that the green mummy comes from Peru.”

“Who denied that it did, sir?  You are illogical—­infernally so.”  The little man rose and straddled on the hearth-rug, with his back to the fire and his hands under his coat-tails.  “Now, sir,” he said, glaring at the young man like a school-master—­ “what the deuce are you talking about?  Out with it:  no evasion.”

“Oh, hang it, Professor, don’t jump down my throat, spurs and all,” said Random, rather annoyed by this dictatorial tone.

“I never wear spurs:  go on, sir, and don’t argue.”

Sir Frank could not help laughing, although he knew that it was useless to induce Braddock to be civil.  Not that the Professor, meant to be rude, especially as he desired to conciliate Random.  But long years of fighting with other scientists and of having his own scientific way had turned him into a kind of school-master, and every one knows that they are the most domineering of the human race.