"You did ring your bell."
"Ah, yes; I know. I am going away, and I wanted my—would you tell Rafferty to bring me—my boots?" Whereupon Johnny rang the bell—not the little handbell, but the other bell. "And I shan't be here to-morrow," continued Sir Raffle. "I'll thank you to send my letters up to the square; and if they should send down from the Treasury;—but the Chancellor would write, and in that case you'll send up his letter at once by a special messenger, of course."
"Here's Rafferty," said Eames, determined that he would not even sully his lips with speaking of Sir Raffle's boots.
"Oh, ah, yes; Rafferty, bring me my boots."
"Anything else to say?" asked Eames.
"No, nothing else. Of course you'll be careful to leave everything straight behind you."
"Oh, yes; I'll leave it all straight." Then Eames withdrew, so that he might not be present at the interview between Sir Raffle and his boots. "He'll not do," said Sir Raffle to himself. "He'll never do. He's not quick enough,—has no go in him. He's not man enough for the place. I wonder why the earl has taken him by the hand in that way."
Soon after the little episode of the boots Eames left his office, and walked home alone to Burton Crescent. He felt that he had gained a victory in Sir Raffle's room, but the victory there had been easy. Now he had another battle on his hands, in which, as he believed, the achievement of victory would be much more difficult. Amelia Roper was a person much more to be feared than the Chief Commissioner. He had one strong arrow in his quiver on which he would depend, if there should come to him the necessity of giving his enemy a death-wound. During the last week she had been making powerful love to Cradell, so as to justify the punishment of desertion from a former lover. He would not throw Cradell in her teeth if he could help it; but it was incumbent on him to gain a victory, and if the worst should come to the worst, he must use such weapons as destiny and the chance of war had given him.
He found Mrs. Roper in the dining-room as he entered, and immediately began his work. "Mrs. Roper," he said, "I'm going out of town the day after to-morrow."
"Oh, yes, Mr. Eames, we know that. You're going as a visitor to the noble mansion of the Earl De Guest."