All about were rocking lights, yellow and green and red, from warships,
tramps, passenger ships, freighters, barges, junks. The water was streaked
with shaking lances of colour.

In the salon, under a reading lamp, sat a man whose iron-gray hair was
patched with cowlicks. Combs and brushes produced no results, so the owner
had had it clipped to a short pompadour. It was the skull of a fighting
man, for all that frontally it was marked by a high intellectuality. This
sort of head generally gives the possessor yachts like Wanderer II,
tremendous bank accounts; the type that will always possess these things,
despite the howl of the proletariat.

The face was sunburned. There was some loose flesh under the jaws. The
nose was thick and pudgy, wide in the nostrils, like a lion's. The
predatory are not invariably hawk-nosed. The eyes were blue--in repose, a
warm blue--and there were feathery wrinkles at the corners which suggested
that the toll-taker could laugh occasionally. The lips were straight and
thin, the chin square--stubborn rather than relentless. A lonely man who
was rarely lonesome.

His body was big. One has to be keen physically as well as mentally to
make a real success of anything. His score might have tallied sixty. He
was at the peak of life, but hanging there, you might say. To-morrow
Anthony Cleigh might begin the quick downward journey.

He had made his money in mines, rails, ships; and now he was spending it
prodigally. Prodigally, yes, but with caution and foresight. There was
always a ready market for what he bought. If he paid a hundred thousand
for a Rembrandt, rest assured he knew where he could dispose of it for the
same amount. Cleigh was a collector by instinct. With him it was no fad;
it was a passion, sometimes absurd. This artistic love of rare and
beautiful creations was innate, not acquired. Dealers had long since
learned their lesson, and no more sought to impose upon him.