resist curiosity. If a crowd collected in the street he always added
himself to it, and he would have stopped to gape at a window with
'Watch this window' written on it, if he had been running for his life
from wild bulls. He was, and always had been, intensely desirous of
some day penetrating behind the scenes of a theatre.

And there was another thing. At last, if he accepted this invitation,
he would be able to see and speak to Alice Weston, and interfere with
the manoeuvres of the hatchet-faced man, on whom he had brooded with
suspicion and jealousy since that first morning at the station. To see
Alice! Perhaps, with eloquence, to talk her out of that ridiculous
resolve of hers!

'Why, there's something in that,' he said.

'Rather! Well, that's settled. And now, touching that sweep, who
_is_ it?'

'I can't tell you that. You see, so far as that goes, I'm just where I
was before. I can still watch--whoever it is I'm watching.'

'Dash it, so you can. I didn't think of that,' said Jelliffe, who
possessed a sensitive conscience. 'Purely between ourselves, it isn't
_me_, is it?'

Henry eyed him inscrutably. He could look inscrutable at times.

'Ah!' he said, and left quickly, with the feeling that, however poorly
he had shown up during the actual interview, his exit had been good. He
might have been a failure in the matter of disguise, but nobody could