"Made you read it!" echoed Mrs. Purcell, majestically; "the word 'made' is misapplied, surely!"
"Well, it is a teaser, isn't it?" said Aldean, frankly; "shouldn't read it to keep myself awake. Boswell's a bit long-winded, ain't he?"
"Boswell, Lord Aldean, whatever he may be, is not frivolous."
"I don't read anything, as a rule," confessed Jim, "except the papers."
Mrs. Purcell frowned. "The general slovenliness of style of the daily journals is not such as Dr. Johnson would have approved," said she, in her deep voice. "The very letters of the illustrious lexicographer have the roll and volume of ethic poetry."
"'Paradise Lost,'" said Miss Ostergaard; "everybody talks about it and no one reads it."
"I have read it, Tui," observed Miss Slarge, rousing herself from her brown study; "it afforded me useful hints on idolatry. Moloch, who is mentioned therein, is identical with the Baal or Bel of the Babylonians. The Romish festival of St. John, at the midsummer solstice, is simply the relic of the Chaldean worship of Tammuz. One of Bel's names was Oannes: the Latinized form of John in the sacred language of the Papists, Joannes. Remove the 'J,' and you can see how the idol was converted into the prophet."
"Most interesting," said Aldean, groaning, as this deluge of hard names rattled about his head. "Do you write like Dr. Johnson, Miss Slarge?"
"Alas! Rubina does not," sighed Mrs. Purcell. "Rather does she adopt the antithetic style of Macaulay, the historian."
The conversation was taking place in Mrs. Purcell's drawing-room round a cheerful fire. In the next room Olive was writing letters. She was, in truth, somewhat depressed by the non-appearance of Mallow, whom she had expected that evening, and felt little inclined for conversation. True to his promise, Aldean had called at Mallow's rooms after dinner, but, finding there neither his friend nor a telegram, had come over to enjoy himself at Campden Hill. But that the business on hand might not be neglected, he had left word that, if a telegram came, it was to be sent on to him at Mrs. Purcell's house. Mallow's absence had not surprised him. He concluded that he was in the neighbourhood of Poplar Street, Hain-hunting. As it was, Mallow was at that moment a prisoner in the Anarchist den, and, by his very warning to Aldean that his absence might be indefinite, he had done away with all chance of rescue.