A most exacting group of bons vivants, these.  The host had realized it and had brought out his best.  Most of it, to be sure, had come from Beaver Street, something “rather dry, with an excellent bouquet,” the crafty salesman with gimlet eyes had said; but, then, most of the old Madeira does come from Beaver Street, except Portman’s, who has a fellow with a nose and a palate hunting the auction rooms for that particular Sunset of 1834 which had lain in old Mr. Grinnells cellar for twenty-two years; and that other of 1839, once possessed by Colonel Purviance, a wine which had so sharpened the Colonel’s taste that he was always uncomfortable when dining outside of his club or away from the tables of one or two experts like himself.

These, then, were the palates to which Breen catered.  Back of them lay their good-will and good feeling; still back of them, again, their bank accounts and—­another scoop in Mukton!  Most of the guests had had a hand in the last deal and they were ready to share in the next.  Although this particular dinner was supposed to be a celebration of the late victory, two others, equally elaborate, had preceded it; both Crossbin and Hodges having entertained nearly this same group of men at their own tables.  That Breen, with his reputation for old Madeira and his supposed acquaintance with the intricacies of a Maryland kitchen, would outclass them both, had been whispered a dozen times since the receipt of his invitation, and he knew it.  Hence the alert boy, the chef in the white cap, and hence the seesawing on the hearth-rug.

“Like it, Crossbin?” asked Breen.

Parkins had just passed down the table with a dust covered bottle which he handled with the care of a collector fingering a peachblow vase.  The precious fluid had been poured into that gentleman’s glass and its contents were now within an inch of his nose.

The moment was too grave for instant reply; Mr. Crossbin was allowing the aroma to mount to the innermost recesses of his nostrils.  It had only been a few years since he had performed this same trick with a gourd suspended from a nail in his father’s back kitchen, overlooking a field of growing corn; but that fact was not public property—­not here in New York.

“Yes—­smooth, and with something of the hills in it.  Chateau Lamont, is it not, of ’61?” It was Chateau of something-or-other, and of some year, but Breen was too wise to correct him.  He supposed it was Chateau Lafitte—­that is, he had instructed Parkins to serve that particular wine and vintage.

“Either ’61 or ’63,” replied Breen with the air of positive certainty. (How that boy in the white apron, who had watched the boss paste on the labels, would have laughed had he been under the table.)