Two of Yeovil's London clubs, the two that he had been accustomed to frequent, had closed their doors after the catastrophe.

One of them had perished from off the face of the earth, its fittings had been sold and its papers lay stored in some solicitor's office, a tit-bit of material for the pen of some future historian.

The other had transplanted itself to Delhi, whither it had removed its early Georgian furniture and its traditions, and sought to reproduce its St.James's Street atmosphere as nearly as the conditions of a tropical Asiatic city would permit.

There remained the Cartwheel, a considerably newer institution, which had sprung into existence somewhere about the time of Yeovil's last sojourn in England; he had joined it on the solicitation of a friend who was interested in the venture, and his bankers had paid his subscription during his absence.

As he had never been inside its doors there could be no depressing comparisons to make between its present state and aforetime glories, and Yeovil turned into its portals one afternoon with the adventurous detachment of a man who breaks new ground and challenges new experiences.
He entered with a diffident sense of intrusion, conscious that his standing as a member might not be recognised by the keepers of the doors; in a moment, however, he realised that a rajah's escort of elephants might almost have marched through the entrance hall and vestibule without challenge.