His prospective host, after many consultations with me, at length
allowed himself to be dissuaded from meeting his lordship in correct
afternoon garb of frock-coat and top-hat, consenting, at my urgent
suggestion, to a mere lounge-suit of tweeds with a soft-rolled hat and
a suitable rough day stick. Again in the matter of the menu for his
lordship's initial dinner which we had determined might well be
tendered him at my establishment. Both husband and wife were rather
keen for an elaborate repast of many courses, feeling that anything
less would be doing insufficient honour to their illustrious guest,
but I at length convinced them that I quite knew what his lordship
would prefer: a vegetable soup, an abundance of boiled mutton with
potatoes, a thick pudding, a bit of scientifically correct cheese, and
a jug of beer. Rather trying they were at my first mention of this--a
dinner quite without finesse, to be sure, but eminently nutritive--and
only their certainty that I knew his lordship's ways made them give
in.
The affair was to be confined to the family, his lordship the only
guest, this being thought discreet for the night of his arrival in
view of the peculiar nature of his mission. Belknap-Jackson had hoped
against hope that the Mixer might not be present, and even so late as
the day of his lordship's arrival he was cheered by word that she
might be compelled to keep her bed with a neuralgia.
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