"The papers have had me engaged to Barent Van Dyne, to Langly Sprowl, to Sir Charles. You may take your choice if you are determined to have me engaged to somebody. No doubt you think my being engaged would make our future friendship safer. I'll attend to it immediately if you wish me to." Evidently she was in a gay and contrary humour when she wrote so flippantly to him. And he replied in kind and quite as lightly. Then, at the week's end he wrote her again that he had considered her letter, and that he accepted the friendship she offered, and gave her his in return. She did not reply. He wrote her again a week later, but had no answer. Another week passed, and, slowly into his senses crept the dread of deep waters closing around him. And after another week he began to wonder, dully, how long it would take a man to drown if he made no struggle. Meanwhile several dozen crates and packing cases had arrived at the Custom House for the Earl of Dankmere; and, in process of time were delivered at the real-estate office of R. S. Quarren, littering his sleeping quarters and office and overflowing into the extension and backyard. [Illustration: "All stacked up pell-mell in the back yard and regarded in amazement by the neighbours."] It was the first of June and ordinarily hot when Lord Dankmere and Quarren, stripped to their shirts and armed with pincers, chisels and hammers, attacked the packing cases in the backyard, observed from the back fences by several astonished cats. His lordship was not expert at manual labour; neither was Quarren; and some little blood was shed from the azure veins of Dankmere and the ruddier integument of the younger man as picture after picture emerged from its crate, some heavily framed, some merely sagging on their ancient un-keyed stretchers. There were primitives on panels, triptychs, huge canvases in frames carved out of solid wood; pictures in battered Italian frames--some floridly Florentine, some exquisitely inlaid on dull azure and rose--pictures in Spanish frames, Dutch frames, English frames, French frames of the last century; portraits, landscapes, genre, still life--battle pictures, religious subjects, allegorical canvases, mythological--all stacked up pell-mell in the backyard and regarded in amazement by the neighbours, and by two young men who alternately smoked and staunched their wounds under the summer sky. "Dankmere," said Quarren at last, "did your people send over your entire collection?" "No; but I thought it might be as well to have plenty of rubbish on hand in case a demand should spring up.... What do they look like to you, Quarren--I mean what's your first impression?" "They look all right." "Really?" "Certainly. They seem to be genuine enough as far as I can see." "But are they otherwise any good?"