'I don't mind. It is a great pleasure to me to see the stories in print. And no one suspects poor little Me. Are they so _very_ badly written?' 'The style is a little--just a little, may I say?--jerky. But the stories are admirable. Do let me have some more, Lady Frances.' 'Remember. No one is to know where you get them.' 'A Masonic secrecy forms part of my character. I even put my own name to them for greater security.' He did. Every week he put his own name to stories which he got from people like this Lady of Quality. 'That ought to disarm suspicion. On the other hand, everybody must know that you cannot invent these things.' Alec laughed. 'Most people give me credit for inventing even your stories.' 'By the way,' she said, 'are you coming to my dinner next week?' 'With the greatest pleasure.' 'If you don't come you shall have no more stories drawn from the domestic annals and the early escapades of the British Aristocracy.' 'I assure you, Lady Frances, I look forward with the greatest----' 'Very well, then. I shall expect you. And remember--secrecy.' She laid her finger on her lips and vanished. The smile faded out of the young man's face. He sat down again, and once more set himself to work doggedly copying out the manuscript, which was, indeed, none other than the story furnished him by Lady Frances. It was going to appear in the next week's issue of the journal, with his name at the end. Was not Alec Feilding the cleverest all-round man in the whole of London--_Omnium artium magister_? CHAPTER V ONLY A SIMPLE SERVICE Mrs. Elstree took the card that the maid brought her. She started up, mechanically touched her hair--which was of the feathery and fluffy kind--and her dress, with the woman's instinct to see that everything was in order: the quick colour rose to her cheek--perhaps from the heat of the fire. 'Yes,' she said, 'I am at home.' She was sitting beside the fire in the drawing-room of Armorel's flat. It was a cold afternoon in March: outside, a black east wind raged through the streets; it was no day for driving or for walking: within, soft carpets, easy-chairs, and bright fires invited one to stay at home. This lady, indeed, was one of those who love warmth and physical ease above all other things. Actually to be warm, lazily warm, without any effort to feel warmth, afforded her a positive and distinct physical pleasure, just as a cat is pleased by being stroked. Therefore, though a book lay in her lap, she had not been reading. It is much pleasanter to lie back and feel warm, with half-closed eyes, in a peaceful room, than to be led away by some impetuous novelist into uncomfortable places, cold places, fatiguing places.