he drew a handful of gold coins from his pocket when it came to paying for
the lunch. His insistence upon bodily health was curious. In accordance
with an arrangement we had made I applied that day for a life policy in
the Loyal Insurance Company for a large sum, and I was exhaustively
overhauled by the medical advisers of that company in the subsequent week.
Even that did not satisfy him, and he insisted I must be re-examined by
the great Doctor Henderson.

It was Friday in Whitsun week before he came to a decision. He called me
down, quite late in the evening,--nearly nine it was,--from cramming
chemical equations for my Preliminary Scientific examination. He was
standing in the passage under the feeble gas-lamp, and his face was a
grotesque interplay of shadows. He seemed more bowed than when I had first
seen him, and his cheeks had sunk in a little.

His voice shook with emotion. "Everything is satisfactory, Mr. Eden," he
said. "Everything is quite, quite satisfactory. And this night of all
nights, you must dine with me and celebrate your--accession." He was
interrupted by a cough. "You won't have long to wait, either," he said,
wiping his handkerchief across his lips, and gripping my hand with his
long bony claw that was disengaged. "Certainly not very long to wait."

We went into the street and called a cab. I remember every incident of
that drive vividly, the swift, easy motion, the vivid contrast of gas and
oil and electric light, the crowds of people in the streets, the place in
Regent Street to which we went, and the sumptuous dinner we were served
with there. I was disconcerted at first by the well-dressed waiter's
glances at my rough clothes, bothered by the stones of the olives, but as
the champagne warmed my blood, my confidence revived. At first the old man
talked of himself. He had already told me his name in the cab; he was