vine and fig
tree in full bearing. Consider the profit and amusement you would derive
from it. If you could see your way to doing this, we could arrange all
the details with your lawyer, and it is possible that the Company might
bear some of the cost. I have put the matter, I trust, in a nutshell. If
you, my dear sir, will interest yourself in building that wall, and will
kindly give us the name of your lawyers, I dare assure you that you will
hear no more from the Great Buchonian."

"But why am I to disfigure my lawn with a new brick wall?"

"Grey flint is extremely picturesque."

"Grey flint, then, if you put it that way. Why the dickens must I go
building towers of Babylon just because I have held up one of your
trains-once?"

"The expression he used in his third letter was that he wished to 'board
her,'" said my companion in my ear. "That was very curious--a marine
delusion impinging, as it were, upon a land one. What a marvellous world
he must move in--and will before the curtain falls. So young, too--so
very young!"

"Well, if you want the plain English of it, I'm damned if I go
wall-building to your orders. You can fight it all along the line, into
the House of Lords and out again, and get your rulings by the running
foot if you like," said Wilton, hotly. "Great heavens, man, I only did
it once!"

"We have at present no guarantee that you may not do it again; and, with
our traffic, we must, in justice to our passengers, demand some form of
guarantee. It must not serve as a precedent. All this might have been
saved if you had only referred us to your legal representative." The
lawyer looked appealingly around the room. The dead-lock was complete.

"Wilton," I asked, "may I try my hand now?"

"Anything you like," said Wilton. "It seems I can't talk English. I
won't build any wall, though." He threw himself back in his chair.

"Gentlemen," I said deliberately, for I perceived that the doctor's
mind would turn slowly, "Mr. Sargent has very large interests in the
chief railway systems of his own country."

"His own country?" said the lawyer.

"At that age?" said the doctor.

"Certainly. He inherited them from his father, Mr. Sargent, who was an
American."

"And proud of it," said Wilton, as though he had been a Western Senator
let loose on the Continent for the first time.

"My dear sir," said the lawyer, half rising, "why did you not
acquaint the Company with this fact--this vital fact--early in
o