Square; it was an odd letter, beginning formally, almost paternally,
and running off into chirruping facetiousness, as if the writer had
tried in vain to subdue his natural gaiety. There were extraordinary
phrases. "I congratulate you on being gazetted major in the regiment
of Old Time." "For my own part I am just beginning my thirty-fifth
round with knuckly life, and I rejoice to say that I have come up
smiling. Floorers I have suffered, not a few, in the rounds
preceding, but I am harder for it, harder and gamer." "Shall we not
crack a bottle together on this side of the circumfluent Oceanus?"
And so on, to the effect that Alexander much wished for a meeting
with his brother, and urged him to come to Theobald's Road as soon
as possible, at his own convenience.

It gave Piers--what he needed badly--something new to think
about. From what he remembered of Alexander, he did not dislike him,
and this letter made, on the whole, an agreeable impression; but he
remembered Daniel's warning. In any case, there could be no harm in
calling on his brother; it made an excuse for a day in London, the
country stillness having driven him all but to frenzy. So he replied
at once, saying that he would call on the following afternoon.

Alexander occupied the top floor of a great old house in Theobald's
Road. Whether he was married or not, Piers had not heard; the
appearance of the place suggested bachelor quarters, but, as he
knocked at what seemed the likely door, there sounded from within an
infantine wail, which became alarmingly shrill when the door was
thrown open by a dirty little girl. At sight of Piers this young
person, evidently a servant, drew back smiling, and said with a
strong Irish accent: