Chapter NineThe lunch went off well. In his relief at having come more than creditably through a much dreaded interview, Cyril Eversley relaxed to play the courteous, gentle-mannered host. In doing so he was not so much playing a part as throwing one off. It was the role of man of business which he found perennially jading and ungrateful. As the scholarly dilettante he was at his ease. Admiral Holden, who had never thought much of him, was surprised to find him such an agreeable host.
The Admiral was feeling pleased with himself—pleased to be up and about again; pleased to be asserting himself with the Eversleys who had certainly considered him as good as dead and buried (he’d show them!); pleased to be visiting his old haunts and saying what a damned filthy place London was, and very muc
