looked at the card he had left. 'Lord Dreever,' it read, and in the
corner the name of a well-known club. The name Dreever was familiar
to Jimmy. Everyone knew of Dreever Castle, partly because it was one
of the oldest houses in England, but principally because for
centuries it had been advertised by a particularly gruesome ghost-
story. Everyone had heard of the secret of Dreever, which was known
only to the earl and the family lawyer, and confided to the heir at
midnight on his twenty-first birthday. Jimmy had come across the
story in corners of the papers all over the States, from New York to
Onehorseville, Iowa. He looked with interest at the light-haired
young man, the latest depository of the awful secret. It was
popularly supposed that the heir, after hearing it, never smiled
again; but it did not seem to have affected the present Lord Dreever
to any great extent. His gurgling laugh was drowning the orchestra.
Probably, Jimmy thought, when the family lawyer had told the light-
haired young man the secret, the latter's comment had been, 'No,
really? By Jove, I say, you know!'
Jimmy paid his bill, and got up to go.
It was a perfect summer night--too perfect for bed. Jimmy strolled
on to the Embankment, and stood leaning over the balustrade, looking
across the river at the vague, mysterious mass of buildings on the
Surrey side.
He must have been standing there for some time, his thoughts far
away, when a voice spoke at his elbow.
'I say. Excuse me, have you--Hullo!' It was his light-haired
lordship of Dreever. 'I say, by Jove, why we're always meeting!'
A tramp on a bench close by stirred uneasily in his sleep as the
gurgling laugh rippled the air.
'Been looking at the water?' inquired Lord Dreever. 'I have. I often
do. Don't you think it sort of makes a chap feel--oh, you know. Sort
of--I don't know how to put it.'
'Mushy?' said Jimmy.
'I was going to say poetical. Suppose there's a girl--'
He paused, and looked down at the water. Jimmy was sympathetic with
this mood of contemplation, for in his case, too, there was a girl.
'I saw my party off in a taxi,' continued Lord Dreever, 'and came
down here for a smoke; only, I hadn't a match. Have you--?'
Jimmy handed over his match-box. Lord Dreever lighted a cigar, and
fixed his gaze once more on the river.
'Ripping it looks,' he said.
Jimmy nodded.
'Funny thing,' said Lord Dreever. 'In the daytime, the water here
looks all muddy and beastly. Damn' depressing, I call it. But at
night--' He paused. 'I say,' he went on after a moment, 'Did you see
the girl I was with at the Savoy?'
'Yes,' said Jimmy.
'She's a ripper,' said Lord Dreever, devoutly.
On the Thames Embankment, in the small hours of a summer morning,
there is no such thing as a stranger. The man you talk with is a
