"Very just," murmured the poor lady, and after a moment's hesitation was
on the point of adding something more; but Mr. Striker here interposed,
after a prefatory clearance of the throat.

"I should like to take the liberty," he said, "of addressing you a
simple question. For how long a period of time have you been acquainted
with our young friend?" He continued to kick the air, but his head was
thrown back and his eyes fixed on the opposite wall, as if in aversion
to the spectacle of Rowland's inevitable confusion.

"A very short time, I confess. Hardly three days."

"And yet you call yourself intimate, eh? I have been seeing Mr. Roderick
daily these three years, and yet it was only this morning that I felt as
if I had at last the right to say that I knew him. We had a few moments'
conversation in my office which supplied the missing links in the
evidence. So that now I do venture to say I 'm acquainted with Mr.
Roderick! But wait three years, sir, like me!" and Mr. Striker laughed,
with a closed mouth and a noiseless shake of all his long person.

Mrs. Hudson smiled confusedly, at hazard; Miss Garland kept her eyes on
her stitches. But it seemed to Rowland that the latter colored a little.
"Oh, in three years, of course," he said, "we shall know each other
better. Before many years are over, madam," he pursued, "I expect the
world to know him. I expect him to be a great man!"

Mrs. Hudson looked at first as if this could be but an insidious device
for increasing her distress by the assistance of irony. Then reassured,
little by little, by Rowland's benevolent visage, she gave him an