"Won't you come, too, Hartley?" asked the Barrister.
"Not if I know it. I've been there about sixty times. If Coryndon wants to see it, I'm thankful to let him go there with you."
Fitzgibbon, who had a craze for borrowing anything that he was likely to want, had persuaded Prescott, the junior partner in a rice firm, to lend him his car, and as he sat in the tonneau beside Coryndon, he pointed out the places of interest. Their way lay first through the residential quarter, and Hartley's guest saw the entrance gate and gardens of Draycott Wilder's house.
"The most interesting and certainly the best-looking woman in Mangadone lives there, a Mrs. Wilder. Hartley ought to have told you about her; he is rather favoured by the lady. Her husband is a rising civilian. Mrs. Wilder has bought Asia, and is wondering whether she'll buy Europe next."
Coryndon hardly appeared impressed or even interested.
"So she is a friend of Hartley's?" he said carelessly. "I hadn't heard that."
Fitzgibbon laughed.
"It's something to be a friend of Mrs. Wilder—that is, in Mangadone."
They sped on over the level road, and the car swung through the streets that led towards the open space before the temple.
"That is the curio dealer's shop. Don't get any of your stuff there. The man's a robber."