Creede, whose life seemed to be one chronic round of debt and dissipation, would have been friendly with anybody who would have used him as Tom used him—who would have played cribbage with him so badly that he, Creede, always rose from the table a winner; and who would have treated him to unlimited supplies of tobacco, and innumerable glasses of Irish whiskey, hot and strong. Tom would never allow Creede to leave his rooms till he was intoxicated, not that the latter ever seemed particularly anxious to go before that happy consummation was arrived at. But Tom was so abstemious a mortal himself that the fact of his encouraging Creede to drink to excess was somewhat singular. “What a beast the fellow is!” he muttered, as he watched Creede go staggering down the street after one of their evenings together. “But he will answer my purpose better than any one else I could have chosen.” During the three weeks preceding Lionel’s trial, Tom went to London about half-a-dozen times. He used to go up in the morning and come back in the evening. One morning he called at Alder Cottage on his way to the railway station. “I’m going up to town to-day,” he said, “and while there I mean to buy and send you a certain article of furniture.” “Very thoughtful on your part, Mr. Bristow,” said Edith with a smile. “But would you mind telling me what the article in question is?” “It is a mahogany wardrobe, and it has been made to fit into the recess in your dressing-room.” “But I am not in want of a wardrobe, whether made of mahogany or any other wood,” said Edith, with a puzzled look. “That doesn’t matter in the least. I shall buy it and send it all the same. The fact is I ordered it when I was in London a fortnight ago. I got Martha Vince to give me the measurement of the recess in which I want it to be fixed.” Edith was mystified, but she had such implicit faith in Tom that she never demurred at anything he either said or did. Two days later the wardrobe arrived. Tom in person had superintended its removal from the truck to the van at the railway station, and he was at Alder Cottage to receive it. The porters, by Tom’s instructions, carried it as far as the landing upstairs, and there left it. “It now remains to be unpacked,” said Tom, “and then Martha and I, with Mrs. Dering’s permission, will try to fix it in the corner it is intended to occupy.” “But why not have kept the railway men to unpack and fix it?” asked Mrs. Garside. “Because there is a little secret connected with this wardrobe,” answered Tom, “of which we four alone must possess the key.” “I like secrets,” said Mrs. Garside. “It is so delightful to know something that nobody else knows.” So the wardrobe was unpacked, and proved to be a very handsome and substantial piece of furniture indeed. It tested their united strength to move it into the position it was to occupy, but when once there they found that it fitted the recess exactly.