II


Gilbert Palgrave turned back to his dressing table. An hour gave him
ample time to get ready.

"Don't let that bath get cold," he said. "And look here. You may
take those links out. I'll wear the pearls instead."

The small, eel-like Japanese murmured sibilantly and disappeared
into the bathroom.

This virginal girl, who imagined herself able to play with fire
without burning her fingers, was providing him with most welcome
amusement. And he needed it. He had been considerably bored of late-
-always a dangerous mood for him to fall into. He was thirty-one.
For ten years he had paid far more than there had been any necessity
to keep constantly amused, constantly interested. Thanks to a shrewd
ancestor who had bought large tracts of land in a part of Manhattan
which had then been untouched by bricks and mortar, and to others,
equally shrewd, who had held on and watched a city spreading up the
Island like a mustard plant, he could afford whatever price he was
asked to pay. Whole blocks were his where once the sheep had grazed.

Ingenuity to spend his income was required of Palgrave. He possessed
that gift to an expert degree. But he was no easy mark, no mere
degenerate who hacked off great chunks of a splendid fortune for the