"Exactly. So for my own sake--and Jephson's--I boarded a train for Jacksonville with the idea of meeting George's train there and coming on here with him. I was going to ask George not to make himself known for a couple of days. Then I proposed to tell Cynthia, and Cynthia only, of his existence. If she objected, all very well--but I'm sure she wouldn't. And I'm sure, too, that George would have done what I asked--he always was a bully chap. But--I missed him. These confounded trains--always late. Except when you want them to be. I dare say George is here by this time?"
"He is," Minot replied. "Came a few hours after you left. And by the way, I arranged a meeting for him with Trimmer and his proposition. The proposition fled into the night. It seems he was the son of an old servant of your father's--Jenkins by name."
"Surely! Surely that was Jenkins! I thought I'd seen the chap somewhere--couldn't quite recall-- Well, at any rate, he's out of the way. Now the thing to do is to see good old George at once--"
He went to the telephone, and got his brother's room.
"George!" A surprising note of affection crept into his lordship's voice. "George, old boy--this is Allan. I'm waiting for you in my rooms."
"Dear old chap," said his lordship, turning away from the telephone. "Twenty-three years since he has seen one of his own flesh and blood! Twenty-three years of wandering in this God-forsaken country--I beg your pardon, Minot. I wonder what he'll say to me. I wonder what George will say after all those years."
Nervously Allan Harrowby walked the floor. In a moment the door opened, and the tall, blond Chicago man stood in the doorway. His blue eyes glowed. Without a word he came into the room, and gripped the hand of his brother, then stood gazing as if he would never get enough.
"Is that a ready-made suit you have on, Allan?" he asked huskily.
"I thought so. It's a rotten bad fit, Allan. A rotten bad fit."
Thus did George Harrowby greet the first of his kin he had seen in a quarter of a century. Thus did he give the lie to fiction, and to Trimmer, writer of "fancy seeing you after all these years" speeches.
He dropped his younger brother's hand and strode to the window. He looked out. The courtyard of the De la Pax was strangely misty even in the morning sunlight. Then he turned, smiling.