Cheynel Gardens is one of those very select thoroughfares that no cab-driver has ever found without the assistance of a local guide. Taximen have “heard of it,” dimly remember having dropped a fare there at some time or other; but where it is, only the police and the postmen know. Often people who live in Cheynel Gardens have only the haziest idea whether they are in Mayfair or Marylebone.
Gordon occupied a corner house that had a garden, probably the garden after which the thoroughfare was named, for there was no other. If a garden can be so called that consists of a twelve by ten paved courtyard occupied by two large bushes in tubs.
It was the last house on the left as you turned in from Brook Street, a handsome, sober pile of red brick and yellow sandstone, with a big study to which stained-glass windows gave the appearance of a well-furnished chapel.
His study was indeed a holy place, for none entered without invitation. It had two doors, one of thick oak, one of deadening baize, so that no sound might disturb Gordon’s close and careful scrutiny of The Economist, which, with the Insurance Review, formed his light reading. By day he perused The Times, by night he read heavy studies in sociology, or, if he were tired, Zur Genealogie der Moral—Nietzsche being one of his favourite authors.
He descended from the cab that brought him home, gave the driver a ten per cent. tip worked out to the nearest penny, and erring on his own side, and walked slowly up the steps. The door opened instantly. It was part of the daily ritual. Trenter took his hat, his walking-stick and his gloves, and Gordon said:
“No letters?”
If Trenter had said no, the ritual would have been interrupted.
“Yes, sir, and——”
No need to say more. Gordon was staring at four immense trunks that almost completely covered the floor space of the hall. Three of them were conspicuously labelled “Not wanted on voyage.” The fourth had a big red “Cabin” pasted on its side.
“What—on—earth—are—these?” asked Gordon breathlessly.