Arch-Plotters.
“Hullo, my noble! what brings you here?”
Jessop Reed took off his glossy, fashionable hat, laid a gold-headed malacca cane across it as he placed it upon the table, and then shot his cuffs out of the sleeves of his City garments, cut in the newest style, and apparently fresh that day. Tie, collar, sleeve-links, pin, chain, tightly-cut trousers, spats, and patent shoes betokened the dandy of the Stock Exchange, and the cigar-case he took out was evidently the last new thing of its kind.
“Cigar?” he said, opening and offering it to the dark, sallow, youngish man seated at an office table, for he had not risen when his visitor to the office in New Inn entered.
“Eh? Well, I don’t mind. Yours are always so good.”
He selected one, declined a patent cutter, preferring to use a very keen penknife which lay on the table, but he accepted the match which his visitor extracted from the interior of a little Japanese owl, and deftly lit by rubbing it along his leg. The next minute the two men sat smoking and gazing in each other’s eyes.
“Well, my brilliant, my jasper and sardine stone, what brings you through grimy Wych Street to these shades?”
“You’re pretty chippy this morning, Wrigley. Been doing somebody?”
“No, my boy; hadn’t a chance. Have you come to be done?”
“Yes; gently. Short bill on moderate terms.”