amused at himself; every intelligent observer is amused at himself pretty often; but he did not doubt merely because he was amused. He took his entertainment over his own doings as a bonus life offered. A great[Pg 11] sincerity of action and of feeling was his predominant characteristic.

[Pg 11]

"Besides, if I'm odd," he went on with a laugh, "it won't be noticed. I'm going to bury myself at Scarsmoor for a couple of years at least. I'm thinking of writing an autobiography. You'll come with me, Cromlech?"

"I must be totally undisturbed," Stabb stipulated. "I've a great deal of material to get into shape."

"There'll be nobody there but myself—and a secretary, I daresay."

"A secretary? What's that for?"

"To write the book, of course."

"Oh, I see," said Stabb, smiling in a slow fat fashion. "You won't write your autobiography yourself?"

"Not unless I find it very engrossing."

"Well, I'll come," said Stabb.[Pg 12]

[Pg 12]

So home they came—an unusual-looking pair—Stabb with his towering bulky frame, his big goggles, his huge head with its scanty black locks encircling a face like a harvest moon—Lynborough, tall, too, but lean as a lath, with tiny feet and hands, a rare elegance of carriage, a crown of chestnut hair, a long straight nose, a waving mustache, a chin pointed like a needle and scarcely thickened to the eye by the close-cropped, short, pointed beard he wore. His bright hazel eyes gleamed out from his face with an attractive restlessness that caught away a stranger's first attention even from the rare beauty of the lines of his head and face; it was regularity over-refined, sharpened almost to an outline of itself. But his appearance tempted him to no excesses of costume; he had always despised that facile path to a barren eccentricity. On every occasion he[Pg 13] wore what all men of breeding were wearing, yet invested the prescribed costume with the individuality of his character: this, it seems, is as near as the secret of dressing well can be tracked.

[Pg 13]

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