After dinner the two elder men retired to Stormont’s study. Lydon went with the ladies into the drawing-room, Stormont excusing his absence with the genial remark that they were treating him as one of the family. After Gloria had played and sung a little, she proposed that they should adjourn for billiards, a game at which she was no mean performer. The billiard-room was next to Stormont’s study, the door of which was open, and as they went in Lydon heard these words uttered in Whitehouse’s rather deep voice: “Yes, it is most unfortunate that the thing should have happened at the moment it did. She is absolutely essential to this particular scheme. We can’t start it without her.” These words made the young man wonder a good deal. What possible business could it be, to the prosecution of which a certain woman was essential? CHAPTER FIVE He had always felt curious on the subject of Stormont’s business, one which evidently brought him in a large income, for how otherwise could he have maintained the upkeep of such an expensive place as Effington. It was strange, too, that the man had never made any allusion to it himself, more especially as he did not appear to be of a reticent or secretive nature. With the majority of persons it is not necessary to know them for very long before they let drop something that proclaims their occupation. He had told the Stormonts all about himself on the occasion of his second meeting with them at Brighton, without any reserve. If he had foregathered more intimately with them at Nice, he would have told them then. Even with such a very reticent man as Craig, you could not have been in his society for a few hours without learning that he was a member of the diplomatic corps. It certainly was odd that Stormont never dropped a remark that enabled you to fix his occupation. He occasionally spoke of himself as a business man, and that was all. To carry on any sort of business, he must have an office or offices somewhere, and presumably they were in London. But Stormont had never given him the address. Only once, when they had travelled together up to London and parted at Waterloo, he had mentioned that he was bound for the City, a sufficiently vague definition. Those words he had overheard uttered by the man Whitehouse aggravated the curiosity he had for long felt on the subject since he had become so intimately acquainted with the family. Very delicately he questioned Gloria as they proceeded with their game in the billiard-room. “I suppose business does not take up all your uncle’s time? He spends a good deal of it in this delightful place,” he said. There was not the slightest hesitation in the girl’s reply. He had long ago made up his mind that everything about Gloria Stormont was open and above-board. How frank she had been about herself, and her youthful days in China with her father and mother.