"Thanks, I'll remember--when it comes to that!"
"You're incorrigible, Stan," said Leroy, as his guests were taking their leave. "You'd better settle down yourself first, and leave Shelton alone."
When they had all gone, the host stood looking at the empty chairs. They seemed, as it were, typical of the weary, empty hours of his life, and for the first time a wholesome distaste of it all swept over him. Day in, day out, an everlasting whirl--wherein he and his companions turned night into day and spent their lives in a hollow round of gaiety, in which scandal, cards, women and wine were chief features. And, at the end! What would be the end?
Then he shook himself from his unaccustomed reverie; Adrien Leroy, the popular idol of fashionable society, was not given long to introspection.
"What next?" he asked himself.
It was Norgate who answered the unspoken query, by announcing that the motor was at the door.
As Adrien descended the stairs, Jasper Vermont entered the hall below him.
"Ah, just in time!" he said with his amicable smile. "You're off to the Park, I suppose?"
"I don't know yet," returned Adrien evasively. "What do you think of the motor?"
"Worthy even of Adrien Leroy," replied Jasper, with the faintest suspicion of a sneer, which, however, passed unperceived by his friend. "By the way," he continued, as they walked to the door together, "I have just left Ada in tears, poor girl; repentance followed closely on repletion. She vows solemnly to refrain from onions and patchouli for the future, and begs for the return of your favour."