'So be it,' said Kelly, pocketing Mr. Wogan's gold, and stepping reluctantly into the house of Le Queux. Mr. Wogan waited until the door closed upon him, and then went on his way alone to Queen's Square. He had not displayed the whole face of his purpose to the Parson. It was not merely to reconnoitre that he pushed forward. The Parson might desire an occasion with the Colonel, but Wogan, for Miss Townley's sake, meant to meet the Colonel first. Betrothed men should not be brawlers, and George was hardly a match for the Colonel. The Colonel was not, in the nature of things, likely to feel well-disposed towards the Parson. The ballad would have turned that ill-disposition into a genuine hostility. So here was one of the reasons, besides the wish to reconnoitre, why Wogan left his friend behind him in Le Queux's gaming-rooms. He would be the lightning-conductor; he would pick a quarrel with the Colonel before Mr. Kelly arrived, if by any means that could be brought about. Mr. Wogan stopped in the shadow a few yards from Lady Oxford's house, and watched. It was a night of triumph for Lady Oxford. A score or so of link-boys yelled and flashed their torches about the portico; carriages and chairs pressed towards the door. Gentlemen with stars upon their velvet coats, and ladies altogether swaddled in lace and hoops thronged up the steps. But of the possible messengers for whom Mr. Wogan looked, not one was to be seen in any corner. Timidity itself might have slept secure. Only a few ragged loiterers stood about in the roadway on the look-out for a lace handkerchief or a convenient pocket. Wogan crossed the road and joined the throng upon the stairs.