"I beg pardon, sir," said the butler, turning his eyes again on the visitor, who was beginning to lose temper. "There is a Mr Robert here--Mr Robert Clareborough. You must mean some other gentleman. Our Mr Robert is quite well, and on the Continent just now." "Impossible!" cried Chester, angrily. "Look here, my man, take this for yourself and my card in to Mr Robert. Say I beg that he will give me a few minutes' conversation." The butler glanced at the card and the coin held out, but took neither. "Beg pardon, sir. I told you that Mr Robert is on the Continent." "Yes; and I tell you that you are not speaking the truth. Do as I tell you. I will wait till he sees me." Chester took a couple of steps forward as he spoke, with the intention of entering the hall, but the butler stood firm, and the footman closed up to his side, the pair effectually barring the way. Chester stopped, feeling that he could do no more, for the servants must have been instructed to deny everybody to him. He thought, too, of his position; he had attended his patient and retained the heavy fee paid him, having, had he so wished, been debarred from returning it by his ignorance of the sender's address. While he was musing the butler said haughtily-- "If you like to leave your card, sir, I'll lay it on the 'all table, and if one of the gentlemen wishes to see you, I daresay he'll write or call." "No," said Chester, irritably. "Tell Mr Robert that I came, and--no, say nothing; I daresay I can find Mr Robert Clareborough at his club, or I shall meet him somewhere else." He turned upon his heel, and walked sharply away, satisfied now that he had found the house, and feeling more eager than ever to obtain an interview with his patient, who would, he felt sure, have his sister by his side. The thought of her position sent the hot blood coursing to the doctor's head, and a chill of horror and anxiety ran through him once more. But he felt that he must wait a little longer and devise some way of obtaining speech with Marion, life being unendurable till he had seen her once again. "New dodge, Mr Roach, sir?" said the footman, when Chester had disappeared. "I don't quite know what to make of it, Orthur," replied the butler, solemnly. "It does seem like a new way of raising the wind. It ain't books nor engravings." "What about being Mr Robert's medical man, though. What do you make of that?" "Well, Orthur, putting that and that together--his quick, jerky, excited way, and his fierce-looking eyes, and his ignorance of Society etiquette as to strangers calling, and wanting to see everybody, just as if he was one of the oldest friends of the family--I should say that he's one of those chaps who get a few names o' people out o' Directories, and then goes and calls." "For swindling and picking up anything as is not out of his reach, sir, or about money?"