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At the dinner at Keable Gowler’s Fifth Avenue house the attention paid to Saunders Rook by the governor, the senators, the assorted congressmen, the professor, and their wives would have flattered a person even less susceptible than he. In trumpet tones Mr. Gowler announced him:

“This is Mr. Saunders Rook, one of my most valued associates. On the Fourth of July, as a protest against our civilization, he will commit suicide in Washington Square.”

“Central Park,” said Saunders Rook, bowing modestly.

“Not really?” they all said in breathless chorus.

“Yes, really,” said Saunders Rook.

He talked, and they listened. He had been expanding the idea, and had worked up an indictment or two against civilization.

Over his after-dinner liqueur the governor declared that, if necessary, he would do the only thing he could think of to prevent Saunders Rook from robbing the State of so valued a citizen, and that was call out the militia. He was not prepared to say, he remarked darkly, how he should employ it, for he was fresh in the gubernatorial chair. However, he knew that a governor has the power to call out the militia, and he was interested to learn what would happen if he did call it out. Surely the case of Saunders Rook, he maintained, warranted the step.