“I’ll make you all pay hell for this. It’s a plot to rob me. She shot herself--she did on my living oath. What have you done with my rose-ring?” The detective exerted some cool pressure. “It’s my duty to warn you, Lightfoot,” he said, “that I’ve a warrant for your arrest in my pocket, and that whatever you say now will be used as evidence before the magistrate.” III. “Of course it is an acquired taste,” said Gilead. “All education is acquired. Do you like olives?” “No, I can’t bear them,” said Miss Halifax, making a face over the unexpected question. “They are invaluable,” he answered, “in bringing out the bouquet of claret. So it is with that Japanese print” (he was standing with her before a fine hachirakaki by Masonobu, which hung upon the wall). “Take it in the right spirit, and then see what that exquisite little arrangement by Whistler yonder owes to it. Why you yourself, you know, are truly insensible of your obligations to this same Masonobu among others.” It was a Sunday afternoon, and he had invited his secretary and amanuensis to tea with him in the Albany, with the express purpose of relating to them, for their personal and private edification, the history in detail of the bird-skins, about which, during the whole day preceding, he had maintained an amused but impenetrable reserve. They knew that he had been successful in his quest, and they knew little else. He tantalized them even now by delaying the recital. “_My_ obligations!” said the young lady, raising her brows in a very pretty puzzled way. “How, Mr Balm?” “Why,” said he, “to what, beyond a naturally refined taste, do you think you owe the judgment so charmingly displayed in the decoration of your own rooms? It was these early Japanese artists who were as responsible as any for the growth among us of a spirit of true appreciation of the beauty and value of line in decorative composition. You must really learn to honour your artistic ancestry, Miss Halifax.” She sighed. “I will try; only I do wish my ancestry had adopted a more attractive convention for its faces. They have no more expression than eggs. It will do, I suppose, if I taste Masonobu and drink in Whistler. You tell me, you know, to love the wine for the olive, and not the olive for the wine.” He laughed. “That is well answered; but I don’t despair of you yet. You shall come by and by to love the olive for its own sake. Yes, that is the Pigalle.” “Isn’t it a dear!” she exclaimed, this time with a whole-hearted admiration. “It ought to be,” he answered. “I gave three thousand guineas for it.” She smiled lovelily on him, thanking him silently for the little whimsical significant confidence. “Mr Balm,” she said plaintively: “when, _please_, are we to hear about the Quest?” “At once,” he answered. “I was only waiting your command. I am just spoiling, as the Americans say, for an audience. You shall own, Nestle, that I have managed, in spite of the French proverb, to draw oil from a wall.”