him this
trick. It was plain, too, now, that Rochester had sent him here as a
substitute.

But the confirmation of his idea did not ease his mind. On the contrary
it filled him with a vague alarm. The feeling of being in a trap came
upon him now for the first time. The joke had lost any semblance of
colour, the thing was serious. Rochester ought to have been back to put
an end to the business before this. Had anything happened to him? Had he
got jailed?

He did not touch the letters. Without raising suspicion, acting as
naturally as possible the part of a peer of the realm, he must escape as
swiftly as possible from this nest of flunkeys, and with that object in
view he accepted the scrambled eggs now presented to him, and the
coffee.

When they were finished, he rose from the table. Then he remembered the
letters. Here was another tiny tie. He could not leave them unopened and
untouched on the table without raising suspicion. He took them from the
basket, and with them in his hand left the room, the fellow in waiting
slipping before to open the door.

The hall was deserted for a wonder, deserted by all but the men in
armour. A room where he might leave the infernal letters, and find a
bell to fetch a servant to get him a hat was the prime necessity of the
moment.

He crossed to a door directly opposite, opened it, and found a room half
library, half study, a pleasant room used to tobacco, with a rather
well worn Turkey carpet on the floor, saddle bag easy chairs, and a
great escritoire in the window, open and showing pigeon holes containing
note paper, envelopes, telegraph forms, and a rack containing the A. B.
C. Railway Guide, Whitakers Almanac, Ruffs' Guide to the Turf, Who's
Who, and Kelly.

Pipes were on the mantel piece, a silver cigar box and cigarette box on
a little table by one of the easy chairs, matches--nothing was here
wanting, and everything was of the best.

He placed the letters on the table, opened the cigar box and took from
it a Ramon Alones. A blunt ended weapon for the destruction of
melancholy and unrest, six and a half inches long, and costing perhaps
half-a-crown. A real Havana cigar. Now in London there are only four
places where you can obtain a real and perfect Havana cigar. That is to
say four shops. And at those four shops--or shall we call them
emporiums--only known and trusted customers can find the sun that shone
on the Vuelta Abajos in such and such a perfect year.

The Ea