'I'm returning home.'
Mr. Merrett whistled.
'Seems as if I might have known you were coming back from the husks and swine, my dropping on to you like this. Anyhow, you're welcome. You come along with me; I'll post you up to date.'
Mr. Merrett, slipping his hand through the other's arm, wheeled him right round. His lordship offered no remonstrance. Not even when, having entered a hansom which Mr. Merrett had hailed, that gentleman directed the cabman to drive to an address in the Euston Road. Scarcely a word was exchanged by the strange companions on the road. Possibly each found his attention fully occupied by a mental revision of this latest phase in the situation. The peer asked a single question as the vehicle stopped.
'What place is this?'
'This is Parkinson's Private Hotel; strictly temperance, and respectable to a fault.'
Mr. Merrett seemed well known in the establishment. He merely stopped to greet a matronly female who met them in the hall, then, leading the way upstairs, entered a spacious apartment on the first floor, which was furnished as a bed- and sitting-room. The gas was lighted; a bright fire burned in the grate. Mr. Merrett, locking the door, drew a heavy curtain in front of it.
'Now, my dear Double, you and I will have a little pleasant conversation.'
Their likeness to each other, as they stood face to face in the well-lighted room, was an illustration of what nature can do when she is in a freakish mood. In height, build, even in feature, there was so close a resemblance that it was not difficult to understand the ease with which either might be mistaken for the other. And yet in carriage and expression there was so marked a difference that, when seen together, it was the unlikeness rather than the likeness which struck one most. Ease of bearing, strength, decision, boldness, were as striking characteristics of the one man as they were wholly lacking in the other. Quickness, resource, courage, were unmistakably attributes of Mr. Merrett, just as plainly as hesitation, doubt, pliancy, were the distinguishing marks of the prodigal peer.
Mr. Merrett's quick eye summed up his lordship in a trice.