The brief career of the cigarette was ended. Chantry's long fingers had locked over his knee. He did not move.
"Sit down, please," he said. "It is precisely because I am your friend that I will not promise."
Landor halted, a question in every line of his face.
"I think I fail to understand," he groped. "I suppose I'm dense."
"No, you're merely transparent. You were going to ask the one thing I can't promise you."
Landor stared, in mystified uncertainty.
"Please sit down. You were going to ask me to take charge of your affairs if anything was to happen. Is it not so?"
"Yes. But how in the world—" "Don't ask it then, please," swiftly. He ignored the other's suggestion. "Get someone else, someone you've known for a long time."
"I've known you for a long time—five years."
"Or leave everything in your wife's hands." Again Chantry scouted the obvious. "If there should be need she could get a lawyer from the city—"