"Of course I could," he assented eagerly, taking down his hat. "I promised to meet our friend Cresswell there." "That ridiculous Poet!" she laughed. "Whatever made him a friend of yours?" "He would tell you Fate," was the smiling reply. "Harvey Grimm would tell you a sense of humour. I really don't know what I could say about it. He isn't a bad fellow." "You are sure you have no more business to attend to?" she asked earnestly. "I can sit and wait quite patiently while you finish." He sighed as he closed his desk. "I am afraid my office itself is rather a farce," he told her. "As a lawyer I have been a failure. My only client passed you on the stairs as he went out." She heard him a little incredulously. "That seems so strange," she observed. "I am sure that you are clever." "The majority of the world seems to have come to a different conclusion," he sighed, as he stood on one side to let her pass out. "Here comes your client back again," she whispered. "I will wait for you upon the landing." Mr. Jacob Potts came puffing up the stairs. He beckoned mysteriously to Aaron Rodd and drew him on one side. "Guv'nor," he whispered, "'ave you got any pals in this building?" "I don't know that I have, particularly," was the somewhat doubtful reply. "Why?" "Gave me quite a turn," Mr. Potts confessed. "There's two of my boys below, two of them who are on that job I came to consult you about." "They are probably shadowing you," Aaron Rodd suggested. "I'd give 'em shadow, if they tried that game on!" Mr. Jacob Potts asserted truculently. "'Owsomever, you've got the office, if there's any pals of yourn about.... If you've any fancy, sir," he added, as he turned away, "for seeing a little bout to-night down at my place, I've arranged for that young fellow I spoke about to come down and put 'em on with Canary Joe. 'Arf-past nine, and no questions arst of a friend." "I'll remember," the other promised. "Won't keep you longer," Mr. Potts observed, turning heavily away. "There's other clients than me about this morning, wot 'o!" He turned back from the doorway and indulged in a huge and solemn wink. "'Arf-past nine," he called out, "nothing charged for admission, but the salt air down Wapping way encourages the thirst, which is good for the trade. Bring a pal, if you've a mind." Aaron waited until his client had reached the first landing before he rejoined Henriette. They drove in what was, to him, unaccustomed splendour to the Milan, and parted in the little hall. "It is foolish," she said, as she held out her hand, "but I feel better because I have been frank with you. Sometimes my fears seem so unreal, and then sometimes I close my eyes and I get these horrible little mind pictures. Ah, but you do not know the terror of them! This is England, though, and that was what they all said--'In England you will be safe.' Tell me you are sure that I am safe?" "Absolutely," he declared confidently.