room to the
other, seeing to details that I should never have thought of.

"You'll be able to find your way down?" he said at last, as he made
for the door. "We dine at seven--perhaps there'll be time to take a
little look round before then, after we've dressed. And I must
introduce Mr. Cazalette--you don't know him personally?--oh, a
remarkable man, a very remarkable man indeed--yes!"

I did not waste much time over my toilet, nor, apparently did Miss
Marcia Raven, for I found her, in a smart gown, in the hall when I
went down at half-past-six. And she and I had taken a look at its
multifarious objects before Mr. Raven appeared on the scene, followed
by Mr. Cazalette. One glance at this gentleman assured me that our
host had been quite right when he spoke of him as remarkable--he was
not merely remarkable, but so extraordinary in outward appearance that
I felt it difficult to keep my eyes off him.

CHAPTER III

THE MORNING TIDE

Miss Raven had already described Mr. Cazalette to me, by inference, as
a queer, snuffy bald-pated old man, but this summary synopsis of his
exterior features failed to do justice to a remarkable original. There
was something supremely odd about him. I thought, at first, that my
impression of oddity might be derived from his clothes--he wore a
strangely-cut dress-coat of blue cloth, with gold buttons, a buff
waistcoat, and a frilled shirt--but I soon came to the conclusion that
he would be queer and uncommon in any garments. About Mr. Cazalette
there was an atmosphere--and it was decidedly one of mystery. First
and last, he looked uncanny.

Mr. Raven introduced us with a sort of old-world formality (I soon
discovered, as regards him, that he was so far unaware that a vast
gulf lay between the manners and customs of society as they are
nowadays and as they were when he left England for India in the
'seventies: he was essentially mid-Victorian) and in order to keep up
to it, I saluted Mr. Cazalette with great respect and expressed myself
as feeling highly honoured by meeting one so famous as my
fellow-guest. Somewhat to my surprise, Mr. Cazalette's tightly-locked
lips relaxed into what was plainly a humorous smile, and he favoured
me with a knowing look that was almost a wink.

"Aye, well," he said, "you're just about as well known in your own
line, Middlebrook, as I am in mine, and between the pair of us I've no
doubt we'll be able to reduce chaos into order. But we'll not talk