SIR HARGRAVE WENDEVER, Baronet, country gentleman, and for a brief space of time a noted figure in financial circles, lounged against the mantelpiece in the waiting room of a famous Harley Street physician on a wet January morning, amusing himself with an old copy of Punch. He was a tall man, inclined to thinness, with a long, lean face, bronzed complexion, and grey-blue eyes. The hair around his ears was greying a little; otherwise he scarcely looked his thirty-nine years. He was alone in the room – a somewhat alien figure in the sombre surroundings, for he had all the appearance of perfect health, and it was obvious that he shared none of the nervous anticipations which so many of Sir James Horridge's patients experienced in that atmosphere of waiting. Nevertheless, it was with an air of content, as though relieved of a brief period of boredom, that he responded to the butler's summons and passed into the consulting room. The physician – a thick-set, hard-jawed man, with keen eyes and heavy, bushy eyebrows – looked up at his entrance, nodded, and pointed to a chair…
