“Everybody” that day did not include Mr. Bulstrode, whose health could not well endure crowds and draughts. But Mrs. Bulstrode had particularly wished to have a certain picture⁠—a Supper at Emmaus , attributed in the catalogue to Guido; and at the last moment before the day of the sale Mr. Bulstrode had called at the office of the Pioneer , of which he was now one of the proprietors, to beg of Mr. Ladislaw as a great favor that he would obligingly use his remarkable knowledge of pictures on behalf of Mrs. Bulstrode, and judge of the value of this particular painting⁠—“if,” added the scrupulously polite banker, “attendance at the sale would not interfere with the arrangements for your departure, which I know is imminent.”