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He left the studio. There was a very slight and almost unconscious movement of relief among the remaining men.

“Your language jarred on his nervous susceptibilities, Dan,” said Michael. “And he thinks our attitude altogether unchristian.”

“Wish he’d get himself fixed up in one of the panels of his own altarpieces, and carried off to the highest church in London,” said Dan. “It would be much the best place for him.”

“I’ll not call with him,” said Alan firmly. “If I do make a martyr of myself it will be by myself or with one of you others.”

There was a silence. Then quite suddenly Barnabas told them of Miss Mason’s little speech to Sally. Somehow he had been unable to mention it in Jasper’s presence.

Again there was a pause. Then Dan laughed.

“You’re confoundedly sentimental, Barnabas, my son. I suppose I’ll have to send that wire.”

Michael smiled, a queer twisted smile.

“Barnabas has a curious faculty for keeping silence till the crucial moment,” he said. “He then makes some little trivial remark which invariably manages to upset all our preconceived notions.”