"But I'll take the month and think it over," thought Vernon, when he had finished his coffee and cigarette. "Much may happen in thirty days which may enable me to get out of the difficulty." Then he took out his watch and noted that it was ten o'clock. "Just time to see Dimsdale," he yawned.
When putting on his light overcoat in the vestibulum, Vernon thought it was a strange coincidence that Maunders should have mentioned--incidentally, of course--the name of the man with whom he had an appointment at half-past ten o'clock. Earlier in the day Vernon had received a pressing note asking him to meet the writer at Colonel Towton's chambers, Ralph Street, St. James's, at that hour. So, as a matter of fact, two names pertinent to the situation had been mentioned, Dimsdale and Towton. Vernon wondered as he walked along Pall Mall what the reason could be. He did not believe in coincidence, and had sufficient experience of life to doubt the existence of chance, so the mention of the names taken in conjunction with the appointment must point to some problem being worked out. Vernon believed--as every thoughtful man must believe--that everything was worked out in the unseen world before it became a factor in the visible plane, and he was quite prepared to find, on this assumption, that the meeting with Dimsdale in Towton's chambers was more important than it appeared to be on the surface. Subsequent events proved that he was right in his conjecture.
Meanwhile--as he was a one-thing-at-a-time man--he sauntered leisurely along towards his destination, wondering what Dimsdale wished to see him about. The ex-police-commissioner was one of the very few people who knew of the business in Covent Garden. Dimsdale had been a life-long friend of Vernon's father, and had welcomed the young man with open arms to his home. It was odd that Vernon had not fallen in love with Ida, as nothing would have pleased Dimsdale better than to have given his daughter and her money to his old friend's son. But Fortune in her freakish way had decided that Vernon should fall in love with Lucy Corsoon, where every obstacle would be placed in the way of a successful wooing, so Ida and Arthur had settled contentedly down into a brother and sister relationship.