“Oh, certainly,” he replied, and went vaguely off in the direction of the billiard-room.  It was light and warm there, though the place was empty, and he decided upon a cigar as a proximate or immediate solution.  He sat smoking before the fire till the tobacco’s substance had half turned into a wraith of ash, and not really thinking of anything very definitely, except the question whether he should be able to sleep after he went to bed, when he heard a creeping step on the floor.  He turned quickly, with a certain expectance in his nerves, and saw nothing more ghostly than Bushwick standing at the corner of the table and apparently hesitating how to speak to him.

He said, “Hello!” and at this Bushwick said: 

“Look here!”

“Well?” Verrian asked, looking at him.

“How does it happen you’re up so late, after everybody else is wrapped in slumber?”

“I might ask the same of you.”

“Well, I found I wasn’t making it a case of sleep, exactly, and so I got up.”

“Well, I hadn’t gone to bed for much the same reason.  Why couldn’t you sleep?  A real-estate broker ought to have a clean conscience.”

“So ought a publisher, for that matter.  What do you think of this ghost-dance, anyway?”

“It might be amusing—­if it fails.”  Verrian was tempted to add the condition by the opportunity for a cynicism which he did not feel.  It is one of the privileges of youth to be cynical, whether or no.

Bushwick sat down before the fire and rubbed his shins with his two hands unrestfully, drawing in a long breath between his teeth.  “These things get on to my nerves sometimes.  I shouldn’t want the ghost-dance to fail.”

“On Mrs. Westangle’s account?”

“I guess Mrs. Westangle could stand it.  Look here!” It was rather a customary phrase of his, Verrian noted.  As he now used it he looked alertly round at Verrian, with his hands still on his shins.  “What’s the use of our beating round the bush?”

Verrian delayed his answer long enough to decide against the aimless pun of asking, “What Bushwick?” and merely asked, “What bush?”

“The bush where the milk in the cocoanut grows.  You don’t pretend that you believe Mrs. Westangle has been getting up all these fairy stunts?”

Verrian returned to his cigar, from which the ashen wraith dropped into his lap.  “I guess you’ll have to be a little clearer.”  But as Bushwick continued silently looking at him, the thing could not be left at this point, and he was obliged to ask of his own initiative, “How much do you know?”

Bushwick leaned back in his chair, with his eyes still on Verrian’s profile.  “As much as Miss Macroyd could tell me.”

“Ah, I’m still in the dark,” Verrian politely regretted, but not with a tacit wish to wring Miss Macroyd’s neck, which he would not have known how to account for.

“Well, she says that Mrs. Westangle has a professional assistant who’s doing the whole job for her, and that she came down on the same train with herself and you.”