s you will
tell me yours."

"That is just what I am trying to explain. Only you are so impatient,
and it--well, it's a trifle complicated." He puffed for a moment in
silence. "Roughly, it might be enough to say that I saw you standing
outside my house a while ago; that I needed a talk with you alone, in
some private place; that I guessed, if you saw me, you would follow with
no more invitation; and that, so reasoning, I led you here, where no one
is likely to interrupt us."

"Well," I admitted, "all that seems plain sailing."

"Quite so; but it's at this point the thing grows complicated."
He rose, and walking to the fireplace, turned his back on me and spread
his palms to the blaze. "Well," he asked, after a moment, gazing into
the mirror before him, "why don't you shoot?"

I thrust my hands into my trouser-pockets and leaned back staring--
I daresay sulkily enough--at the two revolvers within grasp. "I've got
my code," I muttered.

"The code of--these mirrors. You won't do the thing because it's not
the thing to do; because these fellows"--he waved a hand and the ghosts
waved back at him--"don't do such things, and you haven't the nerve to
sin off your own bat. Come"--he strolled back to his seat and leaned
towards me across the table--"it's not much to boast of, but at this
eleventh hour we must snatch what poor credit we can. You are, I
suppose, a more decent fellow for not having fired: and I--By the way,
you did feel the temptation?"

I nodded. "You may put your money on that. I never see you without
wanting to kill you. What's more, I'm going to do it."

"And I," he said, "knew the temptation and risked it. No: let's be
honest about it. There was no risk: because, my good Sir, I know you to
a hair."

"There was," I growled.

"Pardon me, there was none. I came here having a word to say to you,
and these mirrors have taught me how to say it. Take a look at them--
the world we are leaving--that's it: and a cursed second-hand,
second-class one at that."

He paced slowly round on it, slewing his body in the chair.

"I say a second-class one," he resumed, "because, my dear Reggie, when
all's said and done, we are second-class, the pair of us, and pretty bad
second-class. I met you first at Harrow. Our fathers had money: they
wished us to be gentlemen without well understanding what it meant: and
with unlimited pocket-money and his wits about him any boy can make
himself a power in a big