“Will you come in? Mr. Peters has left instructions that you might probably call; Mr. Henfrey, is it not?”
“Yes,” replied Hugh. The man seemed to possess a memory like that of a club hall-porter.
Young Henfrey was ushered into a small but cosy little room, which, in the light of day, he saw was well-furnished and upholstered. The door closed, and he waited.
A few moments after he distinctly heard a man’s voice, which he at once recognized as that of The Sparrow.
The servant had told him that Mr. Peters was absent, yet he recognized his voice—a rather high-pitched, musical one.
“Mr. Henfrey is waiting,” he heard the servant say.
“Right! I hope you told him I was out,” The Sparrow replied.
Then there was silence.
Hugh stood there very much puzzled. The room was cosy and well-furnished, but the light was somewhat dim, while the atmosphere was decidedly murky, as it is in any house in Mayfair. One cannot obtain brightness and light in a West End house, where one’s vista is bounded by bricks and mortar. The dukes in their great town mansions are no better off for light and air than the hard-working and worthy wage-earners of Walworth, Deptford, or Peckham. The air in the working-class districts of London is not one whit worse than it is in Mayfair or in Belgravia.
Hugh stood before an old coloured print representing the hobby-horse school—the days of the “bone-shakers”—and studied it. He awaited Il Passero and the advice which he had promised to give.