I wrote at once, and received some days later a reply signed “per pro Rudolph Rayne,” asking me to call to see the advertiser, who said he would be awaiting me at a certain small hôtel-de-luxe in the West End at three o’clock on the following afternoon.
I arrived at the highly aristocratic hotel at five minutes to three, and was conducted to a private sitting-room by a page who, on ushering me in, indicated a good-looking, middle-aged man seated near the window, reading a newspaper and smoking a cigar.
The gentleman looked up as I approached, then put down his paper, rose, and extended his hand.
“Mr. George Hargreave?” he inquired in a pleasant voice.
“Yes. Mr. Rudolph Rayne, I presume?”
He bowed, and pointed to a chair close to his own. Then he sat down again, and I followed his example.
“I have received hundreds of replies to my advertisement,” was his first remark, “and the reason why your application is one of the few I have answered is that I liked the frank way in which you expressed yourself. Can you sing?”
“Sing?” I exclaimed, startled at the unexpected question.
“Sing,” he repeated.
“Well, yes, I do sing occasionally,” I said. “That is to say, I used to at the sing-songs in France at sergeants’ messes, and so on. But perhaps you mightn’t consider it singing if you heard me,” I ended lightly.