It was the first time that Alistair had visited Mendes in his business quarters, and it took him a minute or two to discover the brass-plate which bore the name of the South American Bank. Even then he had to grope his way through what seemed to him a maze of stairs and passages before he reached a small wired counter, protecting a pale clerk who asked him his business. “I have called to see Mr. Mendes.” He handed in his card with a patronage of which he was quite unconscious. The clerk received it respectfully enough, and passed out of sight round a partition. A minute then elapsed before a man in sober livery came out from a side-door and asked his lordship to be good enough to follow him. He showed Lord Alistair into a small, comfortably-furnished room, in which a man of forty or thereabouts, well dressed and fully self-possessed, was seated at a writing-table. He rose politely as Alistair entered, and offered him a chair. “Mr. Mendes has someone with him at the moment,” he said, speaking courteously, but without any particular deference. “Perhaps it may save time if you can tell me what you wish to see him about.” “I am a personal friend of Mr. Mendes,” returned Stuart haughtily. The other did not seem to feel rebuked. “If you have not called on business it might be better for you to go to his private house,” he said quietly. “Mr. Mendes is a very busy man, and it is against his rule to receive his private friends here, except by appointment.” The last words seemed to be underlined with meaning. Was it possible that this courteous intermediary was already aware that Lord Alistair had no appointment, and was taking it on himself to refuse him an interview with the principal? “I have business of an important character with Mr. Mendes,” Stuart declared in a tone of resentment. “In that case I think you had better let me send in a message of some kind,” persisted his questioner. Alistair flushed up. “Does Mr. Mendes know I am here?” he demanded. The other shook his head slightly. “Mr. Mendes’ orders are very strict, and I am obliged to respect them. I am not authorized to send in a visitor’s card without some intimation of the business on which he has come.”