Today
he was a looker-on, and the ice of his years of bitterness had not
melted. Tomorrow, at any moment, he might catch a whiff of the
fragrance of life, and the blood in his veins would move to a
different tune. This was how it seemed to Aynesworth, as he studied
his companion through the faint blue mist of tobacco smoke.
"This expression of your sentiments," he remarked at last, "is
interesting so far as it goes. I am, however, a practical person, and
my connection with you is of a practical order. You don't propose, I
presume, to promenade the streets with a cat-o-nine-tails?"
"Your curiosity," Wingrave remarked, "is reasonable. Tomorrow I may
gratify some portion of it after my interview with Lady Ruth. In the
meantime, I might remark that to the observant person who has wits and
money, the opportunities for doing evil present themselves, I think,
with reasonable frequency. I do not propose, however, to leave things
altogether to chance."
"A definite scheme of ill-doing," Aynesworth ventured to suggest,
"would be more satisfactory?"
"Exactly," he admitted.
He called for the bill, and his eyes wandered once more around the
room as the waiter counted out the change. The band were playing the
"Valse Amoureuse"; the air was grown heavy with the odor of tobacco
and the mingled perfumes of flowers and scents. A refrain of soft
laughter followed the music. An after-dinner air pervaded the place.
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