"And you must go?"
"Oh, yes;—that's certain. I have pledged myself to go."
"Of course I don't know anything of this matter that is so important to your family."
"No; you do not," said Johnny.
"Can't you explain it to me, then? so that I may have some reason,—if there is any reason."
Then John told the story of Mr. Crawley,—a considerable portion of the story; and in his telling of it, I think it probable that he put more weight upon the necessity of his mission to Italy than it could have fairly been made to bear. In the course of the narration Sir Raffle did once contrive to suggest that a lawyer by going to Florence might do the business at any rate as well as John Eames. But Johnny denied this. "No, Sir Raffle, it is impossible; quite impossible," he said. "If you saw the lawyer who is acting in the matter, Mr. Toogood, who is also my uncle, he would tell you the same." Sir Raffle had already heard something of the story of Mr. Crawley, and was now willing to accept the sad tragedy of that case as an excuse for his private secretary's somewhat insubordinate conduct. "Under the circumstances, Eames, I suppose you must go; but I think you should have told me all about it before."
"I did not like to trouble you, Sir Raffle, with private business."
"It is always best to tell the whole of a story," said Sir Raffle. Johnny being quite content with the upshot of the negotiations accepted this gentle rebuke in silence, and withdrew. On the next day he appeared again at the office in his ordinary costume, and an idea crossed Sir Raffle's brain that he had been partly "done" by the affectation of a costume. "I'll be even with him some day yet," said Sir Raffle to himself.
"I've got my leave, boys," said Eames when he went out into the room in which his three friends sat.
"No!" said Cradell.