"I thank you, no," was the quiet reply.
There was a short pause.
"You wished to see me on some business connected with the election, no doubt?" Brooks suggested.
His visitor shook his head slowly. He knocked the ash from his cigarette and smiled whimsically.
"My dear fellow," he said, "I haven't the least idea why I came to see you this evening."
Brooks felt that he had a right to be puzzled, and he looked it. But his visitor was so evidently a gentleman and a person of account, that the obvious rejoinder did not occur to him. He merely waited with uplifted eyebrows.
"Not the least idea," his visitor repeated, still smiling. "But at the same time I fancy that before I leave you I shall find myself explaining, or endeavouring to explain, not why I am here, but why I have not visited you before. What do you think of that?"
"I find it," Brooks answered, "enigmatic but interesting."
"Exactly. Well, I hate talking, so my explanation will not be a tedious one. Your name is Kingston Brooks."
"Yes."