"I don't care where she is," he said. He seemed determined never to let me finish a sentence. "Send her up here." She was in the kitchen by herself. "He wants to see you at once," I said. "Who does?" she asked. "Mr. John," I said. "What's he want to see me for?" she asked. "How do I know?" I answered. "But you do," she said. She always had an obstinate twist in her, and, feeling it would save time, I told her what had happened. "Well," I said, "aren't you going?" She was standing stock still staring at the pastry she was making. She turned to me, and there was a curious smile about her lips. "Do you know what you ought to be wearing?" she said. "Wings, and a little bow and arrow." She didn't even think to wipe her hands, but went straight upstairs. It was about half an hour later when the bell rang. Mr. John was standing by the window. "Is that bag ready?" he said. "It will be," I said. I went out into the hall and returned with the clothes brush. "What are you going to do?" he said. "Perhaps you don't know it," I said, "but you are all over flour." "Cook's going with me to Scotland," he said. I have looked after Mr. John ever since he was a boy. He was forty-two last birthday, but when I shook hands with him through the cab window I could have sworn he was twenty-five again. THE LESSON. The first time I met him, to my knowledge, was on an evil-smelling, one-funnelled steam boat that in those days plied between London Bridge and Antwerp. He was walking the deck arm-in-arm with a showily dressed but decidedly attractive young woman; both of them talking and laughing loudly. It struck me as odd, finding him a fellow-traveller by such a route. The passage occupied eighteen hours, and the first-class return fare was one pound twelve and six, including three meals each way; drinks, as the contract was careful to explain, being extra. I was earning thirty shillings a week at the time as clerk with a firm of agents in Fenchurch Street. Our business was the purchasing of articles on commission for customers in India, and I had learned to be a judge of values. The beaver lined coat he was wearing--for the evening, although it was late summer, was chilly--must have cost him a couple of hundred pounds, while his carelessly displayed jewellery he could easily have pawned for a thousand or more. I could not help staring at him, and once, as they passed, he returned my look. After dinner, as I was leaning with my back against the gunwale on the starboard side, he came out of the only private cabin that the vessel boasted, and taking up a position opposite to me, with his legs well apart and a big cigar between his thick lips, stood coolly regarding me, as if appraising me. "Treating yourself to a little holiday on the Continent?" he inquired.