CHAPTER VIMiss Paradine had more gifts to distribute—unwrapped this time, and most unobtrusively slipped into the hand of each of the four men for whose presence she had been prepared. The fact that there was a fifth guest was quite smoothly ignored. Elliot Wray was ignored. The others received a small pocket diary each, compact and useful, with pencil attached—brown leather for Frank, scarlet for Dicky, blue for Mark, and purple for Albert Pearson. Not by look or word was the fact so much as glanced at that an uninvited guest was present.
Elliot found himself with a twinge of bitter amusement which passed rapidly into anger. It wasn’t taking very much to make him angry tonight. The present occasion was trivial, but beneath its triviality, like the tide beneath a floating straw, there was
