He was a man of varied dexterities, and he had one faculty of high value, which had often saved him, had never betrayed him; it was intuitive and equal to a sixth sense:  he always knew when it was time to go.  An inner voice warned him; he trusted to it and obeyed it.  And it had spoken now, and there was his trunk half-packed in answer.  But he had stopped midway in his packing, because he had never yet failed to make a clean sweep where there was the slightest chance for one; he hated to leave a big job before it was completely finished—­and Mr. Wade Trumble had refused to invest in the oil-fields of Basilicata.

Corliss paused beside the trunk, stood a moment immersed in thought; then nodded once, decisively, and, turning to a dressing-table, began to place some silver-mounted brushes and bottles in a leather travelling-case.

There was a knock at the outer door.  He frowned, set down what he had in his hands, went to the door and opened it to find Mr. Pryor, that plain citizen, awaiting entrance.

Corliss remained motionless in an arrested attitude, his hand upon the knob of the opened door.  His position did not alter; he became almost unnaturally still, a rigidity which seemed to increase.  Then he looked quickly behind him, over his shoulder, and back again, with a swift movement of the head.

“No,” said Pryor, at that.  “I don’t want you.  I just thought I’d have two minutes’ talk with you.  All right?”

“All right,” said Corliss quietly.  “Come in.”  He turned carelessly, and walked away from the door keeping between his guest and the desk.  When he reached the desk, he turned again and leaned against it, his back to it, but in the action of turning his hand had swept a sheet of note-paper over Ray Vilas’s cheque—­a too conspicuous oblong of pale blue.  Pryor had come in and closed the door.

“I don’t know,” he began, regarding the other through his glasses, with steady eyes, “that I’m going to interfere with you at all, Corliss.  I just happened to strike you—­I wasn’t looking for you.  I’m on vacation, visiting my married daughter that lives here, and I don’t want to mix in if I can help it.”

Corliss laughed, easily.  “There’s nothing for you to mix in.  You couldn’t if you wanted to.”

“Well, I hope that’s true,” said Pryor, with an air of indulgence, curiously like that of a teacher for a pupil who promises improvement.  “I do indeed.  There isn’t anybody I’d like to see turn straight more than you.  You’re educated and cultured, and refined, and smarter than all hell.  It would be a big thing.  That’s one reason I’m taking the trouble to talk to you.”

“I told you I wasn’t doing anything,” said Corliss with a petulance as oddly like that of a pupil as the other’s indulgence was like that of a tutor.  “This is my own town; I own property here, and I came here to sell it.  I can prove it in half-a-minute’s telephoning.  Where do you come in?”