ed the door of the "first floor front," whose wooden
shutters were closely barred. St. George led the way and entered the
bare, unclean passage where discordant voices and the odours of
cooking wrought together to poison the air. He tapped smartly at the
door.

Immediately it was opened by a graceful boy, dressed in a long,
belted coat of dun-colour. He had straight black hair, and eyes
which one saw before one saw his face, and he gravely bowed to each
of the party in turn before answering St. George's question.

"Assuredly," said the youth in perfect English, "enter."

They found themselves in an ample room extending the full depth of
the house; and partly because the light was dim and partly in sheer
amazement they involuntarily paused as the door clicked behind them.
The room's contrast to the squalid neighbourhood was complete. The
apartment was carpeted in soft rugs laid one upon another so that
footfalls were silenced. The walls and ceiling were smoothly covered
with a neutral-tinted silk, patterned in dim figures; and from a
fluted pillar of exceeding lightness an enormous candelabrum shed
clear radiance upon the objects in the room. The couches and divans
were woven of some light reed, made with high fantastic backs, in
perfect purity of line however, and laid with white mattresses. A
little reed table showed slender pipes above its surface and these,
at a touch from the boy, sent to a great height tiny columns of
water that tinkled back to the square of metal upon which the table
was set. A huge fan of blanched grasses automatically swayed from
above. On a side-table were decanters and cups and platters of a
material frail and transparent. Before the shuttered window stood an
observable plant with coloured leaves. On a great table in the
room's centre were scattered objects which confused the eye. A light
curtain stirring in the fan's faint breeze hung at the far end of
the room.

In a career which had held many surprises, some of which St. George
would never be at liberty to reveal to the paper in whose service he
had come upon them, this was one of the most alluring. The mere
existence of this strange and luxurious habitation in the heart of
such a neighbourhood would, past expression, delight Mr. Crass, the
feature man, and no doubt move even Chillingworth to approval.
Chillingworth and Crass! Already they seemed strangers. St. George
glanced at Miss Holland; she was looking from side to side, like a