“What has your friend got there?” asked the other.
“Nothing,” replied the young man who had been addressed as Somers, “nothing at all; that is—only a case of tropical butterflies.”
“Oh! butterflies,” said No. 1 and sauntered away. But No. 2, a keen-looking person with the eye of a hawk, was not so easily satisfied.
“Let us see these butterflies,” he said to me.
“You can’t,” ejaculated the young man. “My friend is afraid lest the damp should injure their colours. Ain’t you, Brown?”
“Yes, I am, Somers,” I replied, taking his cue and shutting the tin case with a snap.
Then the hawk-eyed person departed, also grumbling, for that story about the damp stuck in his throat.
“Orchidist!” whispered the young man. “Dreadful people, orchidists, so jealous. Very rich, too, both of them. Mr. Brown—I hope that is your name, though I admit the chances are against it.”
“They are,” I replied, “my name is Allan Quatermain.”
“Ah! much better than Brown. Well, Mr. Allan Quatermain, there’s a private room in this place to which I have admittance. Would you mind coming with that——” here the hawk-eyed gentleman strolled past again, “that case of butterflies?”