by beginning to talk of Dick; and besides, much as Darrow's opinions
interested her, his personality had never fixed her attention. He always
seemed to her simply a vehicle for the transmission of ideas.

It was Dick who recalled her to a sense of her omission by asking if she
hadn't thought that old Paul looked rather more ragged than usual.

"He did look tired," Mrs. Peyton conceded. "I meant to tell him to take
care of himself."

Dick laughed at the futility of the measure. "Old Paul is never tired: he
can work twenty-five hours out of the twenty-four. The trouble with him is
that he's ill. Something wrong with the machinery, I'm afraid."

"Oh, I'm sorry. Has he seen a doctor?"

"He wouldn't listen to me when I suggested it the other day; but he's so
deuced mysterious that I don't know what he may have done since." Dick
rose, putting down his coffee-cup and half-smoked cigarette. "I've half a
mind to pop in on him tonight and see how he's getting on."

"But he lives at the other end of the earth; and you're tired yourself."

"I'm not tired; only a little strung-up," he returned, smiling. "And
besides, I'm going to meet Gill at the office by and by and put in a
night's work. It won't hurt me to take a look at Paul first."

Mrs. Peyton was silent. She knew it was useless to contend with her son
about his work, and she tried to fortify herself with the remembrance of
her own words to Darrow: Dick was a man and must take his chance with other