CHAPTER XIV. THE CHIRRUP
MR. WRENN looked up from his plate with a sudden start, a wild and febrile glare of horror in his eyes. Old theatregoers, had any such been present, would have been irresistibly reminded by his demeanour of the late Sir Henry Irving in The Bells .
It was breakfast time at San Rafael; and, as always at this meal, the air was charged with an electric unrest. It is ever thus at breakfast in the suburbs. The specter of a fleeting train broods over the feast, turning normally placid men into temporary neuropaths. Meeting Mr. Wrenn in Fleet Street after lunch, you would have set him down as a very pleasant, quiet, elderly gentleman, rather on the mild side. At breakfast, Bengal tigers could have picked up hints from him.
“ Zatawittle?” he gasped, speak
