“I’m sorry,” he replied.  “But I make it a fixed rule to put away my work”—­he waved a hand towards the safe—­“whenever anybody, even Doria, wants to come into the room.”

I glanced around the cheerless place.  There were no traces of work visible.  Save that the quill pens and blotting pad were inky, his library table seemed as immaculate, as unstained by toil, as it did on the occasion of my first visit.

“You needn’t have made all that fuss,” said I.  “I only dropped in for a second or two.  I wanted to ask for a drink and to show you a letter from Jaffery.”

“Oh, Jaffery!” He smiled.  “How’s the old barbarian getting on?”

“Tremendously.  He’s the guest of a Viceroy and living in sumptuousness.  Read for yourself.”

I took from my pocket letter and envelope.  Now I am a man who keeps few letters and no envelopes.  The second post bringing Jaffery’s epistle had just arrived when I was leaving Northlands that morning, and it was but an accident of haste that the envelope had not been destroyed.  I took the opportunity of tearing it up while Adrian was reading.  With the pieces in my hand, I peered about the room.

“What are you looking for?” he asked.

“Your waste-paper basket.”

“Haven’t got such a thing.”

I threw my litter into the grate.

“Why?”

“I’m not going to pander to the curiosity of housemaids,” he replied rather irritably.

“What do you do with your waste paper, then?”

“Never have any,” he said, with his eyes on Jaffery’s letter.

“Good Lord!” I cried.  “Do you pigeon-hole bills and money-lenders’ circulars and second-hand booksellers’ catalogues and all their wrappers?”

He folded up the letter, took me by the arm and regarded me with a smile of forced patience.

“My dear Hilary, can’t you ever understand that this room is just a workshop and nothing else?  Here I think of nothing but my novel.  I would as soon think of conducting my social correspondence in the bathroom.  If you want to see the waste-paper basket where I throw my bills and unanswered letters from duchesses, and the desk—­I share it with Doria—­where I dash off my brilliant replies to money-lenders, come into the drawing-room.  There, also, I shall be able to give you a drink.”

My eyes, following an unconscious glance from his, fell upon a new and hitherto unnoticed object—­a little table, now startlingly obvious, in a corner of the all but unfurnished room, bearing a tray with half full decanter, syphon and glass.

“You’ve got all I want here,” said I.

“No.  That’s mere stimulant. Sapit lucernam.  It has a horrible flavour of midnight oil.  There’s not what you understand by a drink in it.  Let’s get out of the accursed hole.”