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26 Freddy looked at his watch for a minute and a half.

"I ," said he, very deliberately and distinctly as he masticated the Policeman, ""

the muffled sound of a distant explosion ringing in his head, Freddy found himself sitting in a comfortable room fitted up partly as an office, and partly as a luxurious study. He was seated at a handsome mahogany writing-table, furnished with every little luxury that can reduce the toil and enhance the pleasures of pen-work. Above a handsome statuary marble mantelpiece hung a portrait of himself in the act of addressing society at large on the subject of a scroll of parchment with a pendent seal, and regardless of the threatening appearance of a raging thunderstorm, from which a pillar and a crimson curtain afforded an inadequate protection. Beneath his feet was an Axminster carpet of astonishing pile, and two or three easy-chairs, with a comfortable welcoming "come along, old man" sort of expression, stood about the room.

"It is quite clear," said Freddy, "that I'm a banker's clerk of some kind. I wonder what Bank I belong to. Rather a prosperous concern apparently—or, what is still more likely, a flashy and unsubstantial one."

He took some paper from a stand in front of him, and