Desboro smiled as though he were listening; and Clydesdale gingerly replaced the jar and as carefully produced another.
"Ming!" he said. "Seventeenth century Manchu Tartar. I've some earlier Ming ranging between 1400 A.D. and 1600; but it can't touch this, Desboro. In fact, I think the eighteenth century Ming is even finer; and, as far as that goes, there is magnificent work being done now—although the occidental markets seldom see it. But—Ming for mine, every time! How do you feel about it, old top?"
Desboro looked at the vase. The soft beauty of the blue underglaze, the silvery thickets of magnolia bloom amid which a magnificent, pheasant-hued phœnix stepped daintily, meant at the moment absolutely nothing to him.
Nor did the poudre-bleu jar, triumphantly exhibited by the infatuated owner—a splendid specimen painted on the overglaze. And the weeds and shells and fiery golden fishes swimming had been dimmed a little by rubbing, so that the dusky aquatic depths loomed more convincingly.
"Clydesdale," said Desboro in a low voice, "I want to say one or two things to you. Another time it would give me pleasure to go over these porcelains with you. Do you mind my interrupting you?"
The big man grinned.
"Shoot," he said, replacing the "powder-blue" and carefully closing and locking the case. Then, dropping the keys into his pocket, he came over to where Desboro was seated beside the flimsy folding card-table, shook the cocktail shaker, offered to fill Desboro's glass, and at a gesture of refusal refilled his own.
"This won't do a thing to my appetite," he remarked genially. "Go ahead, Desboro." And he settled himself to listen, with occasional furtive, sidelong glances at his beloved porcelains.
Desboro said: "Clydesdale, you and I have known each other for a number of years. We haven't seen much of each other, except at the club, or meeting casually here and there. It merely happened so; if accident had thrown us together, the chances are that we would have liked each other—perhaps sought each other's company now and then—as much as men do in this haphazard town, anyway. Don't you think so?"
Clydesdale nodded.