The young men finished the evening at Pickering’s.  Pickering’s was George’s club.  George considered, rightly, that in the matter of his club he had had great luck.  Pickering’s was a small club, and it had had vicissitudes.  Most men whose worldly education had been completed in St. James’s were familiar with its historical name, but few could say off-hand where it was.  Its address was Candle Court, and Candle Court lay at the end of Candle Alley (a very short passage), between Duke Street and Bury Street.  The Court was in fact a tiny square of several houses, chiefly used by traders and agents of respectability—­as respectability is understood in St. James’s; it had a lamp-post of its own.  The report ran, and was believed by persons entitled to an opinion, that the Duke of Wellington had for some years hidden there the lovely desire of his heart from an inquisitive West End.  Pickering’s had, of course, originally been a coffee-house; later, like many other coffee-houses in the neighbourhood, it had developed into a proprietary club.  Misfortunes due to the caprices of taste and to competition had brought about an arrangement by which the ownership was vested in a representative committee.  The misfortunes had continued, and at the beginning of the century a crisis was reached, and Pickering’s tried hard to popularize itself, thereby doing violence to its feelings.  Rules were abated, and the entrance-fee fell.  It was in this period that Everard Lucas, whose ears were always open for useful items, heard of it and suggested it to George.  George wanted to join Lucas’s club, which was in St. James’s Street itself, but Lucas wisely pointed out that if they belonged to different clubs each would in practice have two clubs.  Moreover, he said that George might conceivably get a permanent bedroom there.  The first sight of the prim, picturesque square, the first hint of scandal about the Duke of Wellington, decided George.  It was impossible for a man about town to refuse the chance of belonging to a club in a Court where the Duke of Wellington had committed follies.

George was proposed, seconded, and duly elected, together with other new blood.  Some of the old blood naturally objected, but the feud was never acute.  Solely owing to the impression which his young face made on the powerful and aged hall-porter, George obtained a bedroom.  It was small, and at the top of the house; but it was cheap, it solved the even more tiresome and uncomfortable problem of lodging; and further it was a bedroom at Pickering’s, and George could say that he lived at his club—­an imposing social advantage.  He soon learnt how to employ the resources of the club for his own utmost benefit.  Nobody could surpass him in choosing a meal inexpensively.  He could have his breakfast in his bedroom for tenpence, or even sixpence when his appetite was poor.  He was well served by a valet who apparently passed his whole life on stairs and landings.  This valet,