that he was still in riding boots.

"Be quick, Hudson!" he said. "We don't want you."

Hudson rolled a nervous eye at him and became clumsily hasty.

"Take your time," his master said quietly. "Nap, my friend, hadn't you
better dress?"

Nap stopped before the fire and pushed it with his foot. "I am not going
to dine," he said.

Lucas Errol said no more. He lay still in his chair with his head back
and eyes half-closed, a passive, pathetic figure with the shoulders of a
strong man and the weak, shrunken limbs of a cripple. His face was quite
smooth. It might have belonged to a boy of seventeen save for the eyes,
which were deeply sunken and possessed the shrewd, quizzical
intelligence of age.

He lay quite motionless as though he were accustomed to remain for hours
in one position. Hudson the valet tended him with the reverence of a
slave. Nap fell to pacing soundlessly to and fro, awaiting the man's exit
with what patience he could muster.

"You can go now, Tawny," the elder Errol drawled at last. "I will ring
when I want you. Now, Boney, what is it? I wish you would sit down."

There was no impatience in the words, but his brows were slightly drawn
as he uttered them,