My taxi drew up at the door. I rang and enquired of my old, smooth-faced antagonist whether Mrs. O'Rane was at home. I was told that she was not.
"Then I'll wait for her," I said, squeezing past him into the hall and taking off my coat and gloves. "Is Colonel Grayle in?"
"Not yet, sir; Mr. Bannerman's in the smoking-room."
"I should like to see him," I said, "if he's not engaged."
Guy dragged himself out of an arm-chair with a mixture of surprise and distrust.
"Hullo! what brings you here?" he enquired. "I never expected to see you."
"Well, I never expected to see you," I answered. "I thought you'd been banished."
He looked at me with cautious absence of expression and then applied himself to treading a little mound of cigar-ash into the carpet.
"Grayle ought to be in soon," he volunteered. "He said he wouldn't be late."
"It was Mrs. O'Rane I came to see."