“I wish to take this drawer and its contents with me,” he said to the woman who stood looking on. “I am quite prepared to give you a receipt for it and, what is more, I will place in your hands the value of the piece of furniture I have taken it from.” “Well,” said the woman, “I suppose I can’t stop you, seeing what’s happened. I ain’t of the having sort, but that chest of drawers cost me a sovereign—_item_, eleven shillings in the Tottenham Court Road—and without the drawer it ain’t worth tuppence.” Freyberger took out his pocket-book, wrote a receipt, and placed it, with a sovereign and a five-shilling piece, in her hand. “There’s a sovereign,” he said, “and the five shillings is for a sheet to wrap the thing up in. I’ll take a sheet off the bed, if you’ll let me; get me some string, too, as much as you have got in the house.” She fetched the string, and between them, they did the thing up securely, then carrying it in his arms as tenderly as if it were a baby, he left the house, got into the cab, and gave the man an address in Old Compton Street, Soho. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XVI THE cab drew up at the address in Old Compton Street given by Freyberger to the driver. It was a small shop, filled with antiques, old china, statuettes, renovated pictures. Here the art of Japan drew a sword or flirted a fan at you; the Middle Ages spoke through the mouthpiece of a battle-dented morion. Behind the counter, in the midst of his treasures, mostly spurious, sat the owner of the shop I. Antonides, smoking a cigarette and apparently lost in reverie. An old man, a very old man, was Antonides. A Greek of the modern Greeks, with the head of a prophet and the hand of a money changer. Behind that parchment-coloured forehead lay a knowledge of ancient and modern art—profound almost as the subject itself. Beauty of craftsmanship appealed to Antonides. He worshipped the Venus of Milo, not for the divine beauty of her form, but for the cunning of the hand that wrought her. A rose had no power to move his soul, but a goblin by Calot, were it in the best style of that master, made him cry out with pleasure. He worshipped art for the sake of art, and he worshipped money for the sake of money. His fortune was reputed to be half a million, and he lived on a pound a week. He was very frank, with that frankness which sometimes veils the deepest and most profound deceit; he had no loves or hates, no heart, no wife, no children or relations. Only his money and his profound knowledge of men and art. There were many curiosities for sale in the shop of Antonides, but the most curious of them all was Antonides, also on sale—at a price. He nodded to Freyberger. “I want you to do a little job for me, Mr Antonides.” “What is the little job, Mr Freyberger?” “Oh, it’s simple enough to you, impossible to anyone else.” “Ah!”