The morning following the disastrous steeple-chase, Mr. Jasper Vermont
ordered his car, and then sat down to write to Adrien. He told him that
he regretted having to leave the Castle so suddenly, but urgent business
required his presence in London, and that he would return to Barminster
as soon as possible.

On the appearance of the motor, he took his departure, travelling direct
to Jermyn Court, where he stayed to lunch, waited on by the attentive
Norgate as though he had been Adrien himself. Then, having filled his
cigar-case with his friend's choicest Cabanas, he strolled through the
fashionable parts of the Park.

The loungers and idle men of fashion who usually frequented it at that
time of the day knew him well, and nodded with forced smiles of
friendship--it was clearly to their interest to be on good, if possible,
cordial terms with a man who always had the entree to the innermost
circles, and who had won the confidence of a popular favourite like
Adrien Leroy.

Those who had not been personally introduced to Jasper, had still heard
reports of his position, and looked after him with that half-envious air
which says so plainly: "There goes the kind of prosperous, wealthy man I myself should like to
be."

Mr. Vermont strolled along, his face wreathed in a perpetual smirk of
recognition, his hat off half a dozen times a minute, acknowledging the
smiling glances accorded to him.