‘He gave me the lie.  Didn’t you hear?’

’I did, and I thought the gift as entirely gratuitous, mon cher, as giving a scuttleful of coals to Newcastle.’

The anecdote-monger stood silent, quelled by this man’s voice.

Then turning to me, the man of the musical voice said, ’I suppose you know something about my friend Lady Sinfi?’

‘I do,’ I said, ’and I am Cyril Aylwin’s kinsman, whom you call his cousin, so perhaps, as every word your friend has said about Sinfi Lovell and me is false, you will allow me to call him a liar.’

A look of the greatest glee at the discomfiture of his companion overspread his face.

‘Certainly,’ he said with a loud laugh.  ’You may call him that, you may even qualify the noun you have used with an adjective if the author of the Proverbial Philosophy can think of one that is properly descriptive and yet not too unparliamentary.  So you are Cyril Aylwin’s kinsman.  I have heard him,’ he said, with a smile that he tried in vain to suppress, ’I have heard Cyril expatiate on the various branches of the Aylwin family.’

‘I belong to the proud Aylwins,’ I said.

The twinkle in his eye made me adore him as he said—­’The proud Aylwins.  A man who, in a world like this, is proud and knows it, and is proud of confessing his pride, always interests me, but I will not ask you what makes the proud Aylwins proud, sir.’

‘I will tell you what makes me proud,’ I said:  ’my great-grandmother was a full-blooded Gypsy, and I am proud of the descent.’

He came forward and held out his hand and said, ’It is long since I met a man who interested me’—­he gave a sigh—­’very long; and I hope that you and I may become friends.’

I grasped his hand and shook it warmly.

The anecdote-monger began talking at once about Sinfi, Wilderspin, and Cyril Aylwin, speaking of them in the most genial and affectionate terms.  In a few minutes, without withdrawing a word he had said about either of them, he had entirely changed the spirit of every word.  At first I tried to resist his sophistry, but it was not to be resisted.  I ended by apologising to him for my stupidity in misunderstanding him.

‘My dear fellow,’ said he, ’not a word, not a word.  I admired the way in which you stood up for absent friends.  Didn’t you, D’Arcy?’

At this the other broke out into another mellow laugh.  ’I did.  How’s your kinsman, and how’s Wilderspin?’ he said, turning to me.  ’Did you leave them well?’

We soon began, all three of us, to talk freely together.  Of course I was filled with curiosity about my new friends, especially about the liar.  His extraordinary command of facial expression, coupled with the fact that he wore no hair on his face, made me at first think he was a great actor; but being at that time comparatively ignorant of the stage, I did not attempt to guess what actor it was.  After a while his prodigious acuteness struck me more than even his histrionic powers, and I began to ask myself what Old Bailey barrister it was.