The wolves and the lamb
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Title: The wolves and the lamb

Author: J. S. Fletcher

Release date: July 4, 2026 [eBook #79012]

Language: English

Original publication: New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1925

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79012

Credits: Emmanuel Ackerman, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WOLVES AND THE LAMB ***

THE WOLVES
AND THE LAMB

A complete list of the books by
J. S. Fletcher already published
may be found at the back of this
volume.

THE WOLVES
AND THE LAMB

BY
J. S. FLETCHER

NEW YORK
ALFRED · A · KNOPF
MCMXXV

COPYRIGHT, 1925, BY ALFRED A. KNOPF, INC. ·
PUBLISHED, JANUARY, 1925 · SET UP, ELECTROTYPED
AND PRINTED BY THE VAIL-BALLOU PRESS,
BINGHAMTON, N. Y. · ESPARTO PAPER MANUFACTURED
IN SCOTLAND AND FURNISHED BY W. F.
ETHERINGTON & CO., NEW YORK · BOUND BY H.
WOLFF ESTATE, NEW YORK. ·

MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

CONTENTS

I | The Wolves, 9
II | The Lamb, 17
III | A Dead Man’s Orders, 25
IV | “He will be just in Time!” 33
V | The Initial Paces, 41
VI | Mrs. Walsingham at Home, 50
VII | Carsdale’s Carefulness, 59
VIII | A Pledge Redeemed, 67
IX | Plain Speech, 75
X | News for Mrs. Walsingham, 83
XI | Unforeseen, 91
XII | Mr. Carsdale’s Chambers, 99
XIII | The Bond Street Jeweller, 107
XIV | Burgoyne Starts a New Trail, 115
XV | Mrs. Walsingham Admits, 123
XVI | Conspirators, 131
XVII | A Student of Problems, 139
XVIII | Blair’s Third Notion, 147
XIX | The Man at the Theatre Door, 156
XX | Mr. Carsdale is Confronted, 165
XXI | A Weaving of Webs, 173
XXII | A Council of War, 181
XXIII | The Eve of the Battle, 189
XXIV | Miss Guyner Intervenes, 197
XXV | The Blank Cheque, 205
XXVI | Every Woman for Herself, 213
XXVII | Plain Truth, 221
XXVIII | A Question of Account, 229
XXIX | The Silent Tenant, 237
XXX | Burgoyne Faces the Music, 246
XXXI | Was It Murder? 254
XXXII | Sleuth Hounds, 262
XXXIII | Sanctuary, 270
XXXIV | Knight-Errant, 277
XXXV | For Sylvie’s Sake, 285
XXXVI | Inspector Skarratt Investigates, 293
XXXVII | The House Next Door, 301
XXXVIII | Salving a Fortune, 309

THE WOLVES
AND THE LAMB

CHAPTER I
THE WOLVES

“Three Hundred Thousand Pounds! And in the hand of an inexperienced youngster of twenty-one. And—incidentally—in Mr. Barclay Leverton’s!”

Carsdale flung down the letter which he had been reading, and with a cynical laugh that came as a note of exclamation at the end of his involuntary burst into speech, crossed the room, and throwing open the window, leaned over the sill and looked out upon Norfolk Street, lying deep down below. It was nearly ten o’clock of a lovely May morning, and in the street itself, and in the Strand at its head, and along the Embankment at its foot, men were quickening their last paces in a laudable desire to be in office or chambers by the hour at which London, laziest city in the world in respect to its early business hours, gets into harness for the day. There was a sense of generous warmth and of new life in the spring air; the people who tenanted the floor immediately beneath the offices of Leverton & Carsdale had taken a fancy that year to ornament their window-ledges with flowers, and the scent of the well-filled boxes, just watered by a girl-clerk, came floating up to Carsdale’s nostrils as he leaned out. But Carsdale neither noticed the hurrying men, nor the bright sunlight, nor the fragrance of the innocent blossoms; all that he was conscious of as he stood there, drumming impatient fingers on the sill, and staring with unseeing eyes at the high buildings in front, or the moving figures below, was that a callow youth had expressed a desire to entrust Barclay Leverton with the management and investment of a fortune of three hundred thousand pounds. A fine sum, thought Carsdale, with another cynical laugh; a fine, handsome, substantial, comfortable sum!—a sum out of which there should be good pickings for whoever was lucky enough to handle it.

The striking of the neighbouring clocks roused Carsdale from his reverie, and with an impatient shrug of his shoulders he turned from the window and went back to the desk, on which he had thrown the letter which had given him food for thought. But instead of picking it up and reading it again, he took a cigar from an open box, and having lighted it, turned and contemplated his own reflection in a mirror which hung over the mantelpiece. This personal inspection was as critical as if it was being made by another man; when it was over, he felt somewhat impressed by himself. He was tall; he had a good figure; he could smile pleasantly and ingratiatingly; he possessed a handsome face and curly dark hair, and darker eyes: he was scrupulously well-dressed; by a mere effort of will he could assume a cheery, good-tempered, optimistic expression which was very taking and had often proved useful in critical situations. And blowing out a cloud of opalescent smoke, he nodded at his mirrored self and smiled.

“I think John Carsdale is more likely to attract a youngster than Barclay Leverton is!” he muttered as he turned from the mirror and placed the tip of a finger on one of a series of electric bells. “The great thing is—the usual thing—opportunity—opportunity!”

The door opened with a noiseless jerk, and a boy’s head and shoulders appeared. The shoulders were garbed in a smart uniform of blue and silver; the head, surmounted by an unruly thatch of sandy-coloured hair, seemed unduly large for the shoulders, and was fronted by a face which for its distinguishing features showed a turned-up snub nose, a very wide mouth, and a pair of remarkably alert blue eyes. The eyes fastened upon Carsdale in a silent inquiry.

“Ask Mrs. Walsingham to be kind enough to come here,” said Carsdale. The sharp face disappeared as instantaneously as it had shot into sight; the door closed. And Carsdale sat down at the desk, and picking up the letter, fingered it nervously until the reopening of the door roused him from the train of thought into which he had fallen. Then he looked up, half rising from his chair.

“Shut the door, Sylvie,” he said in a whisper. “I—I want to talk to you.”

The woman who entered glanced sharply at Carsdale with a slight uplifting of her fine eyebrows, silently closed the door, and took the chair at the side of the desk which he indicated with an outstretched finger. For a moment he regarded her critically.

“You’re looking very well this morning,” he said, suddenly. “In fact, at your best. And I’m glad of it.”

The woman smiled—a quiet, inscrutable smile which suggested many things. She was a pretty woman with all the outward signs of refinement and delicacy strongly marked; her hair, her teeth, her hands all showed the elaborate care of a person scrupulously particular about the details of the toilet; if she was gowned somewhat elaborately for a business office, if the rings which sparkled on her slim white fingers seemed a little conspicuous amongst books and papers, both rings and gowns were in the best of taste, and seemed to belong to the wearer as naturally as her fine eyes and delicate ears. Wherever she went, this was a woman to be noticed—very careful and discerning observers would have said, after a keen inspection of her, that she was also a woman of considerable possibilities in more directions than one.

“And why this particular expression of pleasure?” she said, half-mockingly, half-satirically. “For some reason of—business, eh?”

Carsdale tossed the letter which he was still nervously fingering across to her.

“It’s an excellent idea to have a fascinating young woman in an office, Mrs. Walsingham,” he said, with a light laugh. “There—read that.”

Mrs. Walsingham took the letter and glanced it rapidly over as a preliminary to a careful reading.

“Oh?” she remarked. “A private letter to Mr. Leverton.”

“It wasn’t marked private,” answered Carsdale carelessly. “And haven’t I been opening all Leverton’s letters since he was taken ill? By the by, have you heard anything this morning?”

“Yes. He had a very bad night,” replied Mrs. Walsingham. “I am to telephone again later, after the doctors have been. Now let me read this letter, whatever it may be.”

What Mrs. Walsingham, secretary to Leverton & Carsdale, and particular friend of John Carsdale, read, was a communication written in a boyish hand, bearing date of the previous day, and addressed from a Southampton hotel. And as she read, she decided that the writer, however young and callow he might be, was frank and candid and trusting to a degree which might involve him in danger.

“Dear Mr. Leverton” (ran the letter): “I am a stranger to you, but you will remember that you and my father, Martin Shrewsbury, were close friends before he left England for the West Indies, some years ago. I am his only son—and only child—Richard—age twenty-one. My dear father suddenly died six weeks ago, and of course I have come in for everything—he left me, in all, a little more than £300,000. It is really about this that I am writing to you. The money is now—everything having been cleared up here—in bankers’ hands in London. Of course, I want to invest it. I have heard my father speak highly of you as a financial man, and I found your address amongst his papers. Perhaps, for the sake of your old friendship, you will give me the benefit of your experience and advice? You see, I have never been in England before. My father meant to send me to school in England, but when I was about old enough to leave, my mother died, and as he had no one but me, my coming was put off from time to time, and in the end I stayed at home. So I don’t know much of English matters, nor of business, except of what I learnt on our plantations. It was my father’s earnest wish that I should come to England as soon as he was dead; he had left his affairs in such a state that everything could be immediately wound up. So here I am, and I feel everything very strange!

“I intend to leave Southampton for London early to-morrow morning, and I will venture to call upon you as soon as possible after my arrival.

“Yours sincerely,
“Richard Shrewsbury.”

Mrs. Walsingham read this letter twice over before she folded it up and handed it back across the desk. Her face was as calm and inscrutable as ever when she looked at Carsdale.

“Well?” she said.

Carsdale waved his cigar with a flourish that suggested much.

“Three hundred thousand pounds!” he exclaimed.

Mrs. Walsingham regarded him steadily out of her half-closed eyes.

“Well?” she repeated.

Carsdale sprang to his feet and began to pace the room. “Three hundred thousand pounds!—a raw youth of one-and-twenty who has never set foot in England before!—my dear Sylvie, what a chance for you and me!” he said, presently coming to a halt at the side of his companion’s chair. “What a chance!”

“This letter is addressed to Barclay Leverton,” she said pointedly.

“Barclay Leverton,” answered Carsdale, “is very ill in bed, and is likely to remain there for some weeks. This young Johnny Rawbones is coming here to-day—to-day!—and we shall see him. And—you and I are clever people, Sylvie.”

“Middlingly clever—there is room for improvement in each of us,” answered Mrs. Walsingham. “So—you want to be first in the field?”

“Naturally! And it ought to be an easy thing,” said Carsdale. “The youngster comes here—Mr. Leverton is unfortunately away from business but his partner, Mr. Carsdale, is not, and Mr. Carsdale, who has opened and read Mr. Shrewsbury’s letter, will be happy to do all that Mr. Leverton would wish to do for the son of his old friend. And—Mr. Carsdale can make himself very ingratiating to young gentlemen with money. So—if she pleases—can Mrs. Walsingham.”

“If she pleases,” observed Mrs. Walsingham. “The ‘if’ is an important word, though a small one.”

“And three hundred thousand pounds is an important matter,” said Carsdale. “I think that you and I together, Sylvie, should be able to do something with this boy before he sees Leverton. We can enjoy a long start—and first impressions make a big difference. That’s why I said I was so glad to see you looking at your best this morning.”

Mrs. Walsingham made no immediate reply. She sat twisting the rings about her fingers and apparently lost in thought. And suddenly she turned sharply on Carsdale, who was still pacing up and down, puffing hard and fast at his big cigar.

“You’ve got to remember, Jack,” she said, in quick, decisive tones, “that Leverton and this boy are sure to meet—eventually.”

“It’s the start I want,” answered Carsdale. “Only let me—and you—get our spoons into the pudding first! And, according to the doctors, if Leverton recovers pretty quickly, it’ll be weeks and weeks before he’s fit for business. So that——”

Mrs. Walsingham held up a finger.

“Details, Jack—attend to details!” she said, warningly. “Remember there’s such a person as Miss Frances Leverton in the world.”

“A girl of nineteen against—against you and me!” exclaimed Carsdale. “Come, come! Why——”

“Frances Leverton, in her way, is as sharp as you are,” interrupted Mrs. Walsingham. “You know as well as I do that she’s been coming here every two or three days ever since her father was taken ill, wanting to know everything. How would you keep her from finding out about this boy? And when Leverton found that you’d kept that letter from him——”

“Yes, Frances is decidedly in the way,” said Carsdale, hastily. “But that can be got over. The youngster could be kept away from here, and——”

A sharp ring at the telephone which stood on the desk broke in upon Carsdale’s observations. He flung aside his half-smoked cigar, and dropping into his chair, picked up the receiver.

“Yes—yes!” he said mechanically. “Yes—this is Mr. Carsdale. Yes—what do you say?”

Mrs. Walsingham, who had taken possession of Richard Shrewsbury’s letter again, and was re-reading it thoughtfully, heard a sudden, sharp exclamation from Carsdale, and turned to see him drop the receiver as he wheeled round his chair. He stared at her with widening eyes.

“Leverton’s dead!” he exclaimed. “D’you hear? Leverton’s dead!”

“Dead?” she said. “Why——”

“Died twenty minutes ago,” answered Carsdale. “The doctor says——”

But at that moment the door opened, and the sandy hair and sharp blue eyes of the office-boy showed themselves again. And this time sounds came from the wide mouth.

“A gentleman, sir—Mr. Richard Shrewsbury!”

CHAPTER II
THE LAMB

It was characteristic of Mr. John Carsdale, and of Mrs. Walsingham, that at the first sound of the opening door their faces assumed that curiously indifferent and expressionless look which has come to be associated with the term business. Carsdale glanced at the office-boy as if that youthful functionary had been some machine which had just executed its purely mechanical message: his companion remained apparently absorbed in the reading of the letter.

“Where is Mr. Shrewsbury, Griffkin?” asked Carsdale.

“In the waiting-room, sir,” answered the boy.

“Did you tell him that Mr. Leverton was not here?”

“No, sir—told him nothing. Your orders, sir.”

“Quite right. Bring him in, Griffkin. You needn’t go, Mrs. Walsingham,” said Carsdale, as the secretary made a professional movement towards the door. “I think I shall want you. At once, Griffkin—straight in!”

The boy vanished, leaving the door ajar; a moment later, he reappeared, to throw it wide open, and to admit a young gentleman who advanced into the room with an air of shy expectation. And as he crossed the threshold the man and woman who rose to greet him looked at him with a curiosity which was all the greater because it was so carefully concealed, and each, after one sharp glance at the caller, thought the same thought—that Mr. Richard Shrewsbury was not at all what they had expected him to be, and both looked at him again, with different motives.

It was very evident that Mr. Shrewsbury, ignorant of England though he might be, was English from head to foot. He was certainly bronzed and tanned to a degree quite unusual in Europe, but there was nothing in his whole six feet of height that did not bespeak the English blood, pure and unmixed for generations. Tall, slim, athletic, broad of shoulder, slender of flank, he was of the type that one sees nowhere in the world but in English hunting-fields and on English cricket-grounds—except when it is wanted for the sterner games of war and needful adventure. If he had lived in England all his life, said Mrs. Walsingham to herself, his hair would have been a light brown; the fierce suns of the West Indies had deepened it to a rich chestnut which was well in keeping with the dark tint of his cheeks. And being a judge of manly beauty, she decided that here was a youngster who was handsome as the youthful Greek gods are supposed to have been, and who was at the same time utterly unconscious that all women would admire the strength and grace of his figure, his square chin, his firm mouth, almost innocent of moustache, the direct gaze of his grey-blue eyes, and the untrammelled freedom of his gait. She felt a quick leaping of her pulses as she looked at him, and it was with difficulty that she kept admiration out of the eyes which she so vigorously schooled to instant obedience.

As for Carsdale, he looked at the visitor with a growing consciousness that this was not exactly what he had expected to meet. There was something in the young man’s appearance which showed that he was no fool; he might be inexperienced even to greenness, but he looked to have a will of his own. And Carsdale, stepping forward to meet him with outstretched hand, assumed his most serious air.

Young Richard Shrewsbury took the offered hand in a grip which made Carsdale think of giants and blacksmiths.

Mrs. Walsingham smiled as she saw Carsdale wince beneath the unconscious strength; she smiled again as she saw the youngster’s face flush under its tan.

“Mr. Leverton?” said Richard, eagerly. “This is kind, sir—you will think me a very early caller, but——”

Carsdale lifted a hand.

“I’m very sorry, Mr. Shrewsbury,” he said, motioning Richard to a chair, “but I am not Mr. Leverton. I am Mr. John Carsdale, his partner. This lady is Mrs. Walsingham, our confidential secretary. The fact is Mr. Shrewsbury, Mr. Leverton has been ill for some time, and as I open all letters that come here, I opened yours this morning, so we were expecting you. In fact, we were just talking of you.”

Richard Shrewsbury heard all this with growing wonder and interest; he was already speculative and inquisitive about this obviously-man-of-the-world Carsdale, and boyishly conscious of Mrs. Walsingham’s charm and pretty face. He shyly offered her his hand, and gripped hers as mightily as he had grasped Carsdale’s. But Mrs. Walsingham was of the sort that would have picked up a white-hot iron if need be without uttering a sound or winking an eyelash, and she let her hand rest in the young giant’s as long as he, from sheer confusion and shyness, cared to hold it, and meanwhile favoured him with the full battery of her eyes, whereat he blushed up to his own—after which he somehow managed to get into the easy chair which Carsdale had motioned him to take.

“I—I’m awfully sorry to hear about Mr. Leverton,” he found himself saying, when he had taken another look at his companions and his surroundings. “I hope it is not a serious illness?”

Carsdale looked at Mrs. Walsingham; Mrs. Walsingham looked at the floor.

“Well—er, it’s very serious, Mr. Shrewsbury,” replied Carsdale. “Ver-y serious indeed. I—ah, well, I don’t know that there’s any need to beat about the bush. The fact is, Mr. Leverton is dead.”

“Dead!” exclaimed Richard, staring blankly at his informant. “Dead? Ah, I see!—I suppose he has been dead for some time? Of course, I didn’t know.”

“He has been dead just about half an hour,” answered Carsdale, coolly glancing at the clock. “I had just received the news of his death over the telephone when you were announced. We were not exactly surprised, for he has been very ill, but the end came quite suddenly at last.”

Richard looked from one to the other with a puzzled expression. He made as if to drag his long limbs out of the very low chair into which they had been consigned.

“I’m most awfully sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know Mr. Leverton, of course, but I’d like to have seen him for my father’s sake—he often spoke of him. I—perhaps I’d better go, Mr. Carsdale.”

But Carsdale waved him back into the chair.

“Not at all, not at all!” he said “As I told you, I am—was, rather—Leverton’s partner, and I know that nothing would please him better than that I should do for you what he would have done. So please command me in any way, Mr. Shrewsbury—I dare say I can give you the same services and advice that he would have given.”

The lad’s face flushed with pleasure at the warmth and kindliness of Carsdale’s tone.

“That’s very kind of you, sir,” he said. “I’m awfully obliged. Of course, I’ll come to you, as soon as I get settled down.”

Carsdale laughed—an indulgent and fatherly laugh.

“You’d much better come to me before you get settled down,” he said, smiling benignantly. “Otherwise, you may be settling down in the wrong place. I learnt from your letter to poor Leverton that you are quite a stranger in London.”

“I am a stranger to England—I never saw English soil before yesterday morning. Oh, yes, it’s all strange—very!” replied Richard.

“Well, then, remember the old adage,” said Carsdale, who had a vague and much mixed notion that he had some Scriptural warrant for what he was saying, “and bear in mind that strangers are often taken in. If Leverton had been here, the first thing he would have done would have been to see that you were comfortably established in this howling wilderness. He, no doubt, would have carried you off to his own house—I can’t, for I’m a bachelor, and live in rooms in which I can only just turn around. But I can help you to find a proper corner for yourself—no man better for, as Mrs. Walsingham there will assure you, I know London as well as I know this room.”

Mrs. Walsingham turned her eyes once more on Mr. Shrewsbury, and again smiled on him.

“Mr. Carsdale has an extensive and peculiar knowledge of London,” she said. “You would find him a wonderful guide, Mr. Shrewsbury.”

“It’s awfully kind of you,” said the caller. “I—yes, I do find it rather—immense.”

“And you have been in it—an hour or two, eh?” laughed Carsdale. “Wait until you see it. Now, seriously, to what hotel have you gone?”

Richard blushed once more, boyishly.

“I’m afraid it’s not up to much,” he said, apologetically. “It’s one I heard my father mention, but perhaps things are changed since his day.” He gave the name of an old-fashioned hotel that had been famous in certain circles thirty years before, and Carsdale threw up his hands.

“Oh, that’ll never do!” he said. “The glory has vanished from that establishment long since. Now, let me advise you. What you ought to have is a suite of rooms of your own in the West End, and a good man-servant of your own, and I can put my finger on the very place, and on the very man, to-day. That’s much better than living in a hotel, and you can dine out whenever you like. I can show you the rooms I’m speaking of this afternoon.”

“It’s very good to take so much trouble,” said Richard. “I should like that—I hate hotels. But your time?”

Carsdale waved his hand.

“Oh, we manufacture time here in London!” he said airily. “Besides, I want to do for you just what Leverton would have done. Yes, we’ll see those rooms this afternoon. Then I suppose you’ll want a good tailor, and a good bootmaker, and all the rest of it—leave all that to me, and I’ll see that you are properly attended to. This man-servant that I can get for you is an excellent creature—thoroughly experienced, and so on—but it is never wise to ask a valet as to what tradesmen you should patronize—never!”

“Isn’t it?” asked Richard innocently. “Why?”

“Because they care to feather their own nests,” replied Carsdale, solemnly, shaking his head. “When you want any advice about buying anything in London, trust to a disinterested friend, or to your business man, or you’ll be cheated. That is of course until you gain some experience of the town, as you soon will do.”

Richard ventured to smile at Mrs. Walsingham—he scarcely knew why.

“Then I’m afraid I’ll have to trouble you at first, Mr. Carsdale,” he said, “for I have no friends in London. When I got here this morning and saw how big it was I—well, I began to feel a bit lonely and frightened.”

Carsdale’s face became sympathetic. He shook his head and glanced at Mrs. Walsingham.

“Yes,” he said, gravely. “A man may be as lonely as a hermit in London. But you won’t be lonely—you’re young, and you’ll soon make friends. We must see to it that they’re the right sort. Well, now,” he continued, rising from his chair and glancing at the clock, “I’m afraid I must turn to business. But I can give you this afternoon, Mr. Shrewsbury, with pleasure. I’ll call for you at your hotel at three o’clock. Until then—don’t lose yourself in our wilderness!”

Richard felt himself dismissed, and made his bow to Mrs. Walsingham. Carsdale let him out by a side door, and took him to the elevator.

“Don’t be afraid to command my services in any way,” he said, as he shook his visitor’s hand. “I want you to feel that you can get from me what you’d have got from my late partner.”

“It’s very kind of you,” said Richard. He hesitated a moment at the door of the elevator. “I should like to send my sympathy to Mr. Leverton’s family,” he said shyly. “Perhaps you’ll tell me what to do?”

“Oh, to be sure, to be sure!” replied Carsdale. “This afternoon, then.”

He waved his hand, and gave Richard another of his friendly and brilliant smiles as the elevator dropped, but the smile had vanished, and his face was perplexed, when he re-entered his room to rejoin Mrs. Walsingham. And Mrs. Walsingham, also re-entering at the same moment, but from another door, showed him an equally perplexed countenance. Carsdale stopped, staring at her. She came straight towards him, biting her upper lip, and she inclined her head in the direction of the room from which she had just come.

“Jack!” she whispered. “There’s Frances Leverton in her father’s private room; she came some time ago, Griffkin says. And, I say, Jack—Winch, the solicitor, is with her!”

CHAPTER III
A DEAD MAN’S ORDERS

Carsdale’s first action, on receiving this intimation from Mrs. Walsingham, was to step swiftly past her, and to close the door through which she had just come, and which communicated with a general office wherein the boy Griffkin and a young lady typist were wont to discharge their tasks and to receive callers. He turned round on the secretary with an astonished stare.

“What—here, almost within an hour of her father’s death!” he exclaimed.

“I told you she is as sharp as you are,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “She must have called for Winch and brought him straight here. And—why?”

Carsdale first shrugged his shoulders and then spread out his hands.

“Goodness knows—I don’t!” he answered. “It seems—unseemly. Perhaps she wants some papers—the will, it may be. Besides as you know, Leverton had his own private concerns here, just as I have mine. I can’t stop her from going into her father’s private room.”

“No, because she’s in,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “And what is more, the door’s locked. Griffkin heard it lock as soon as they entered.”

Carsdale started.

“The door—locked?” he exclaimed. “Good God, what does that mean? That sounds mysterious.”

“I should think it means that she and Winch are going through Leverton’s private desk and his private safe,” said Mrs. Walsingham, regarding him steadily. “What do you think?”

But Carsdale merely shrugged his shoulders again, and smiled enigmatically. He turned to the paper-littered desk behind him, and picking up Richard Shrewsbury’s letter, placed it carefully in his pocket-book.

“I’ve already said that I can’t help what she or Winch do in that room,” he answered. “What’s more to the point is—what do you think of the youngster?”

“That he’d better be caught young,” replied Mrs. Walsingham tersely. “He’s the sort that will soon grow out of the callow stage. He’s no fool, Jack—only young and green. Be careful. And don’t go too fast at it.”

“No, no!—I think I see the way,” said Carsdale. “Now, these people in Leverton’s room? You’d better go back to yours, and I’ll go on with my work—I want them to think that all’s going as usual. I’ll leave my door open, so that I shall know when they come out—I’d give something to know why on earth they came at all!”

Mrs. Walsingham made no reply to this; she picked up some documents and went away, and Carsdale having followed her out into the general office to give some orders to the girl typist, left his door open and kept an eye on that behind which his late partner’s daughter and her solicitor were busied with—what? And instead of sitting down at his desk, he moved restlessly about his room, wondering why Frances Leverton should have hurried away from her father’s death-bed, and come to the office in this mysterious fashion.

But Carsdale—and a few other people—knew that the business relations of Barclay Leverton and himself were peculiar. There was no legal partnership between them. It was true that their names appeared in conjunction on the list of tenants painted up in the marble-paved hall on the ground floor of the palatial building of which they occupied the top-story; that they were blazoned forth, again in conjunction, on the heavy brass plate of the swing doors which gave admission to their offices, but the real truth was that they were only partners when it suited them both to be partners. They joined in paying the rent and the rates and the office expenses; they mutually shared the services of Mrs. Walsingham, of Miss Rousby, the typist, and of Griffkin, the office-boy. They had had business affairs in common; sometimes they had business affairs in which other men joined. But each had his own affairs, his own business; each had his own secrets. And the people who knew Leverton well, and Carsdale well, knew that each could, if he pleased, be as close and secret as the grave.

To men who had only a superficial knowledge of this establishment, the precise nature of the business carried on by Leverton & Carsdale, in conjunction or separately, was more or less of a mystery. They did not describe themselves, and were not described anywhere, as anything. In plain truth, they were agents, speculators, and dabblers of a comprehensive, all-embracing sort. They turned their brains, hands, money to anything that seemed likely to be profitable. They were adepts at promoting companies, at advising people on the investment of capital, at introducing men of ideas to men of means, at showing a poor inventor how to profit by his invention. All manner of strange and curious folk went up and down the elevator to and from Leverton & Carsdale’s—some wore glad and gleeful countenances, even at the end of a year’s experience of them; some began to cultivate a gnashing of teeth and a muttering of curses before many weeks had passed. There were men who hinted that strange tales could be told of the establishment, who wagged the head at the name of Leverton, and winked the eye at that of Carsdale, but in spite of that there was always a steady stream of business, and each man always seemed to be advising somebody, or engineering some important schemes for somebody else. And there were still other men who hinted—more quietly and darkly—that if anybody knew the real and inner workings of the concern, whether in its joint or its single capacities, that person was the lady known as Mrs. Walsingham, who was held to be the confidante of both men, and represented them very readily in their absence.

But Carsdale knew that Leverton like himself, had secrets which he shared with no one, and he wondered as he waited for the door of Leverton’s room to open, if the dead man’s daughter had come so hurriedly from her father’s death-bed in connection with one of them. Of Frances Leverton, Carsdale, despite his reference to her as a youthful person, had a secret and a deep fear. He knew that she was something more than clever; he had an instinctive feeling that she had no great belief in him. On the rare occasions on which he had visited the Maida Vale flat in which Leverton and his daughter—an only child—resided, he had more than once caught the girl watching him in a curious fashion, and he had said to himself as he remembered her grave and steady eyes, and the firmness of the lips which could look very determined in conjunction with an equally firm and resolute chin, that Miss Frances Leverton had got all her father’s shrewdness, and a great deal more business capacity than Leverton himself had ever possessed. Other people saw the girl as a handsome young woman of nineteen who was naturally bright, vivacious, merry, and companionable: Carsdale only knew that she invariably froze to him, that her grey eyes grew hard, and her chin aggressive, and that she always seemed to be searching into and examining his inner self. In fine he was very well aware that Frances Leverton did not trust him any more than any sensible being would trust a wolf that has found entrance to a fold of young lambs.

“I’d give anything if I knew what they’ve come for!” repeated Carsdale, after he had kicked his heels for another ten minutes. And growing impatient and tired of inactivity, he went into the outer office, sent Miss Rousby to Mrs. Walsingham’s room with a message which would keep her there, despatched Griffkin to the post-office, and thus cleared the court for a meeting with Frances Leverton and her man of law. By that time Carsdale’s temper was ruffled; the locking of the door had touched his pride; something told him that in that mere act there was a tacit declaration of war on Frances’s part.

The door opened at last, and the girl came out, carrying a small despatch box. Carsdale’s quick eyes passed from her and her burden to the solicitor; he, too, carried another, a larger, despatch box. And Carsdale knew, then, that they had been examining Leverton’s papers, and were carrying at any rate some of them away.

Carsdale had sufficient knowledge of Frances Leverton’s character to know that she would like him none the better if he affected a personal grief for her father which he did not feel. And possessing a certain quality of straightforwardness, and not being in anywise deficient in courage, he went directly to the point which was in his mind.

“I don’t think it a very polite thing that you should come here and lock yourself and Mr. Winch in that room, Miss Leverton,” he said. “No one would have interrupted, whatever business you had to do.”

Frances Leverton regarded him calmly.

“I am not so sure of that, Mr. Carsdale,” she answered. “I have been subjected to interruptions more than once on coming here.”

Carsdale shrugged his shoulders in his characteristic fashion.

“Oh well!” he said. “When offices are used as these have been, people get into the habit of running in and out. But it gives a bad impression to the clerks, when principals or the representatives of principals, lock doors against other principals. And it seems to me strange that you should come here immediately after your father’s death and—I judge from what I see—examine and remove papers in which I may be concerned.”

The solicitor, a keen-eyed, but mild-faced elderly man, pushed himself forward.

“Miss Leverton has only done exactly what her father wished her to do, Mr. Carsdale,” he said quietly. “I think,” he continued, turning to Frances with an air of wise suggestion, “I think, my dear, that under the circumstances you should tell Mr. Carsdale why you came here this morning in what may seem rather a hurry.”

“Oh, no matter, no matter!” exclaimed Carsdale. “I don’t wish to trouble Miss Leverton.”

But Miss Leverton looked at him gravely and followed Mr. Winch’s advice.

“Yes,” she said. “Perhaps—perhaps I ought to have spoken to you first, Mr. Carsdale. But Griffkin said you were particularly engaged, and I have much to do. Well—last night, although the doctors had said nothing of it, my father seemed to develop some fear that he might die suddenly, and he gave me instructions that, if he did, I was to go at once to Mr. Winch, to ask him to accompany me here, and to open the private safe with a key which was in Mr. Winch’s possession, and to take away a certain bundle of papers and a package. I have only carried out his instructions—and if I locked the door it was because I did not want to be interrupted.”

Carsdale suddenly became all outward sympathy and agreeableness.

“Oh, all right, all right, Miss Leverton!” he said. “Sorry I said what I did, but I’m sure you’ll understand. You see, your father and I always ran in each other’s rooms quite freely—I don’t know that we ever locked anything up from each other. But these are doubtless quite private matters—of course, I had nothing to do with his private desk and his safe. Oh, that’s all right! Now, Miss Leverton, is there anything I can do—anything I can take off your shoulders? Pray tell me if there is.”

But Miss Leverton answered quietly that she was much obliged to Mr. Carsdale, but there was nothing: Mr. Winch and herself could undertake all that was necessary, especially as her father had desired that his funeral arrangements should be of the simplest nature. And then she and the solicitor went away, and Mr. Carsdale, after twisting his moustaches for a moment, during which he stood in an attitude of deep thought, went into Mrs. Walsingham’s room and dismissed Miss Rousby, and carefully shut the door upon her slim figure.

“It’s nothing,” he said, turning to Mrs. Walsingham reassuringly. “Nothing! She’s only been to fetch some papers and things—it turns out that Leverton got a notion into his head that he might die suddenly, and in that case he wished her to remove certain things. Oh, it’s nothing.”

Mrs. Walsingham gave him a queer look.

“That’s exactly like you,” she said. “How do you know what has been taken away. You ought to have insisted, in view of your relations with Leverton, that nothing should be touched except under your inspection.”

“Oh, you can’t interfere with a man’s private safe,” said Carsdale, shrugging his shoulders. “This is some private matters. I know very well what papers of mine Leverton had, and they amount to nothing. Now, look here, Sylvie—I’m going up town to see after the arrangements for this young Shrewsbury. I shall make a very good day’s work out of my introductions—and I’ll not be back until evening, so you must take charge. There’s nothing particular, and if there is, and you can’t do it yourself, tell them Leverton’s dead, and I’m out until to-morrow.”

Then Carsdale went off at his usual breakneck speed, and Mrs. Walsingham sat in her cozy little office and thought. She remained in thought until Miss Rousby had gone to lunch; then she took a letter from her desk and, going into the general office, sent Griffkin off to the City with it, and she subsequently took the trouble to look out of the window and to watch the young gentleman go leisurely down the street in the direction of the Temple station. And then, she herself being the only living soul in the suite of offices, Mrs. Walsingham passed rapidly into the dead man’s private room, and went straight to the safe which had just been visited by Frances Leverton. For Mrs. Walsingham was burning with curiosity and eagerness to make herself assured of a certain something, and without delay she drew a key from her corsage and opened the heavy door. A moment later she had closed it again. She knew then what she had wanted to know—she knew what the dead man’s daughter had carried away.

CHAPTER IV
“HE WILL BE JUST IN TIME!”

Miss Leverton and Mr. Winch, each carrying a despatch box, the contents of which were as yet unknown to either, passed out of the coolness of the marble-paved hall of Abbotsbury House into the warmth of Norfolk Street, and turned upward to the bustling Strand. And Mr. Winch, remembering all the circumstances of this unusual morning, halted.

“I think, my dear,” he said, glancing reflectively at his burden, and then at Frances, and then along the street, “I think we had better take a motor-cab. It is true that our burdens are not very heavy, but their contents may be very valuable. I have little doubt they are—and we ought not to run the risk of having them snatched from us, and this is a busy hour of the day; moreover, I am sure you are tired. And therefore—yes, driver, we will hire you. 250A, New Square.”

Frances was glad to set down her burden on Mr. Winch’s desk in a quiet and peaceful old room in an equally peaceful and quiet house in Lincoln’s Inn. The presence of Mr. Winch himself, a grey-whiskered, fatherly man of leisurely movements, was restful after the loud and bustling personality of John Carsdale, and the atmosphere of his offices, where all seemed to go smoothly and quietly, was vastly preferable to that of the mahoganied and enamelled suite in Norfolk Street, where the click of the typewriter, and the ring of the telephone bell was ever insistent. And Mr. Winch seemed to recognize that the girl felt this, and he drew up the easiest chair in the room to the side of his desk for her, and motioned her to be at rest in it.

“Now, my dear,” he said, taking his own chair and putting on his spectacles, “let me see the memorandum of instructions which your father gave you last night about this matter. You say you wrote his instructions down just as he gave them?”

“Word for word,” replied Frances, producing a folded paper. “And I afterwards read over to him what I had written.”

“Very well, very well,” said Mr. Winch. “Now, let me read it all over again more carefully—we only glanced through it before. Well, now——”

He spread out the sheet of foolscap which the girl handed him, and holding it at the distance of an inch or two before his spectacled nose, read its contents aloud, slowly and ruminatively.

“May 18, 1908.

“Memorandum of Instructions from Barclay Leverton to Frances Leverton: in case of B. L.’s sudden death.

“First. Within an hour of my death (or as quickly as may be possible after that occurs) you are to go to Mr. Septimus Winch, in New Square, and to ask him to accompany you to my office in Norfolk Street, and to take with him the key of my private safe, which I recently handed to him.

“Second. You are to open the safe, and to take from the right-hand drawer the packet of securities which you will find there, and which is done up in brown paper, and sealed in red wax. These you will hand to Mr. Winch.

“Third. From the left-hand drawer you will take the small package which is done up in cartridge paper and sealed in black wax, and the large envelope which lies beneath it, similarly sealed. These you will carry away yourself, taking care not to release your hold upon them.

“Fourth. You and Mr. Winch will return to his office at once with these things, and Mr. Winch will immediately deposit the packet of securities sealed in red wax in his safe, to be properly examined at some other time.

“Fifth. You and Mr. Winch will then open the envelope sealed in black, and will read its contents, which are two papers marked on the outsides A and B respectively.

“Sixth. You will then open the sealed packet, and examine the object referred to in these papers.

“Seventh. Mr. Winch will then seal up both packet and envelope again, and will at once, and in your presence, deposit both with his bankers until the date mentioned in the papers A and B.”

“Um!” said Mr. Winch, laying down the sheet of foolscap on his desk. “There appears to be a great deal of mystery in these instructions, my dear. You have no idea what it is that is referred to here and the object in the sealed packet?”

“None except that it is something of considerable value or great importance,” replied Frances.

“Evidently—evidently!” assented Mr. Winch. “Now, I wonder why my late client never mentioned this matter to me?”

“He never even mentioned it to me,” said Frances. “I think, perhaps, that he might have said more last night, but he became very weak—too weak to talk—after he had dictated that memorandum.”

“Aye, just so, just so! Well, now,” continued Mr. Winch, rising and possessing himself of the bundle of papers sealed with red wax. “We will discharge the first of our duties by placing these securities in my safe. See, my dear, we will deposit them here, in this drawer, to be examined at our leisure. And now—now that is done, we will see what is in this envelope.”

Frances Leverton watched the old lawyer almost apathetically as he slowly took up the heavily-sealed envelope, turned it over two or three times as if it had been a curiosity, and methodically inserted the point of an old-fashioned ivory paper-cutter beneath the flap. She had not expected her father to recover from his illness, and his death had not come as a surprise to her, but she was alive to the fact that she was now quite alone in the world, so far as kith or kin were concerned, and although she had been busily engaged all the morning, she was dully conscious that a great event in her life had happened, and that within the next few days she would have to think seriously as to her future. And believing the task in which she and Mr. Winch were engaged to be one which only affected her late father’s business affairs, she had no great interest in it, beyond a desire to carry out his wishes—the mystery of the memorandum did not appeal to her as much as it did to the old gentleman, who was just then drawing out of the stout envelope two sheets of equally stout paper.

“Let us be in order,” observed Mr. Winch. “We will take A first. Now, my dear, perhaps we can read this together.”

But in spite of this suggestion, Mr. Winch read the document aloud, dwelling impressively upon every word.

“Abbotsbury House, Norfolk Street, Strand,
“London, W.C.
“June 21, 1905.

“Barclay Leverton, Esq.

“Dear Sir,—

“I acknowledge hereby the receipt from you of the sum of five thousand pounds sterling, which you have lent me for the purposes of my proposed exploration of Central South America, upon which I am just starting.

“As security for this loan I have deposited with you a diamond necklace which is my own whole and sole property, and which has been in possession of my family for the last hundred years, and is believed to have once been the property of the Empress Maria Louisa.

“I hereby agree that if I do not repay to you the sum of five thousand pounds, with interest at the rate of five per cent. per annum, on or before June 21, 1908, the diamond necklace above mentioned is to become your property, to be disposed of at your discretion.

“Yours faithfully,
“Ralph Seymour Burgoyne.”

Mr. Winch took off his spectacles, and turned an astonished face on his companion, who on her part was now awakened to a keen interest.

“Burgoyne!” exclaimed Mr. Winch. “Why, that is surely the traveller, the great explorer?”

“Who is said to be lost,” remarked Frances, eagerly. “Don’t you know—nothing’s been heard of him for over a year.”

“To be sure—to be sure, my dear!” said Mr. Winch. “Dear me!—this is a very remarkable document. I had no idea that your father had been engaged in any transaction of this kind. However,” he continued, with a side-glance at the packet which Frances had brought from Norfolk Street, “we now know, my dear, what is in that small parcel—a diamond necklace. We had better examine it at once, and ascertain that it is safe.”

“But we have not yet read paper ‘B,’” said Frances. “Hadn’t we better follow the instructions of the memorandum, Mr. Winch?”

“True, true, so we had,” replied the old lawyer, picking up the second of the papers. “Now, what have we here?—ah, some notes in your father’s handwriting. Let me see—um—ah!—perhaps you will read, this my dear!—your father’s calligraphy always was a little puzzling.”

“Well, this, then, is dated May 14, 1907,” said Frances. “Just about a year ago. This is what he says:—

“Memorandum as to the Transaction between Captain Burgoyne and Myself, and referred to in the Paper marked ‘A.’

“A rumour having reached England that Captain Burgoyne and his party have been lost in the wilds of Central South America, and that there is little hope of their returning home, I think it well to write down what my wishes are with respect to the diamond necklace which he left with me as security for the £5,000 which I lent him for the purposes of his expedition.

“If the £5,000 so advanced, and the interest upon it at five per cent. per annum, is not paid (or arranged for) on or before June 21, 1908, I (or my executors in case of my death between now and then) will be quite justified in selling the necklace at our discretion. That is a point upon which Captain Burgoyne and I were quite at one when the money was advanced. Although the necklace has been in his family for a long time, he has no sentimental feeling about it, and he has more than once expressed to me his firm determination never to marry, so that there is small expectation (if, as I hope, he is alive) of his having son or daughter to leave it to.

“If, however, I am living on June 21, 1908 (which is doubtful, as I suffer from a serious affection of the heart), and if Captain Burgoyne has not then redeemed the necklace, I shall not dispose of it, but shall hold it at his disposal for at least one year longer. And I wish my daughter Frances, to whom I shall leave all I have, to do what I should do, and my executors to respect my desires in the matter.

“Barclay Leverton.”

The girl folded the formal-looking paper into its original crease, and laid it softly down by its fellow document. She turned to the old solicitor with a glint of tears in her eyes.

“You will do what my father wished, Mr. Winch?” she said. “I know you’re one of the executors.”

“Oh, of course, of course, my dear!” exclaimed Mr. Winch. “Yes, certainly we shall respect his wishes. Really, this is quite romantic! But let us look at the necklace. Once the property of the Empress Maria Louisa, who was, I think, the second wife of Napoleon Buonaparte. Most interesting!—the necklace must be very beautiful.”

But when between them, they had undone the various wrappings in which the necklace was packed, and had at last brought it to light, Mr. Winch felt himself disappointed. The old gold settings were dull and tarnished: the stones, he said, looked like pieces of glass.

“But look at their size and their fire!” said Frances. “Oh, Mr. Winch, this is worth much more than five thousand pounds.”

“Very probably, my dear, very probably,” assented Mr. Winch. “And therefore all the more reason why you and I should promptly pack it, seal it, and carry it to my bankers, together with those documents. Let us go at once.”

Half an hour later, as they came out of Mr. Winch’s bank in Chancery Lane, Frances suddenly caught the old man’s arm, and pointed to a newspaper contents bill which a lad was holding in front of him as he cried his wares.

“Look, look!” she exclaimed. “Do you see it? ‘News of the Burgoyne Expedition—All Safe’!”

She almost snatched a paper from the boy, while Mr. Winch felt with both hands for a copper. Suddenly she thrust the paper before his eyes.

“There!” she said. “Oh, you can’t see without your glasses. Listen, then—‘The Burgoyne Expedition, seven all told, has arrived at Lima, and will leave at once for England, and may be expected at Southampton, about June 20.’ There, Mr. Winch!”

Mr. Winch nodded his head several times before he looked at Frances, and gravely observed: “He will be just in time!”

CHAPTER V
THE INITIAL PACES

Young Richard Shrewsbury went away from Abbotsbury House in a state of pleasurable excitement. He thought Mr. Carsdale a most agreeable and good-natured man, and Mrs. Walsingham a very pretty and fascinating woman; he congratulated himself on the fact that Fate had thrown Carsdale in his way, and he wondered if Mrs. Walsingham was a wife or a widow. Until he had stepped into Carsdale’s room he had felt lonely, and a little afraid of the great whirling, confusing life into which he had so suddenly been thrown; now he was no longer solitary or alarmed; Carsdale’s breezy manner and calm optimism had acted like a tonic on his nerves; he strode up Norfolk Street, feeling as fresh as the May morning which was covering London with a haze of glory, and something whispered to him every moment that he was young, and healthy, and possessed three hundred thousand pounds, and that the ball of Life was at his feet for him to kick as high as he pleased. Oh, yes, he said to himself, it was decidedly good to be alive!

At the top of Norfolk Street he stopped, to stare about him with increased delight. So far, he had seen nothing of London. The hotel to which he had driven on his arrival was an old-fashioned hostelry in the neighbourhood of Charing Cross; a house which had once had a reputation that still remained as a cherished memory in the minds of old fogies; he had driven straight from it to Leverton’s office, and had been too much occupied with thoughts of meeting his father’s old friend to look about him. But now having four hours to spare before keeping his afternoon appointment with Carsdale, he was keenly conscious of that desire to wander and to explore which quickly obsesses all youngsters who strike London for the first time. And with a wholesome unconcern of destination, and being aware of the money in his pocket, this wide-eyed adventurer went whithersoever he liked during what remained of the morning and in the warm noontide and the early afternoon, with the result that Carsdale, who was the soul of punctuality wherever money was concerned, had to wait five minutes for him at the hotel. He laughed as the young man came hurrying in.

“It is easy to see what you have been up to, my friend!” he said. “I suppose you think London is a city of—what shall we say?—Fairyland?”

“It’s the most wonderful place I ever dreamt of,” replied Richard in all simplicity. He dropped into a chair at Carsdale’s side, and looked round him at the somewhat ancient and dingy fittings and furniture of the smoking-room in which they sat, and his face expressed his thoughts. “I see now,” he continued, “why you threw up your hands when I told you where I was stopping. I should think this place is very old-fashioned. Just because I was passing it, and was near it, I went into the Ritz to get some lunch. I don’t suppose there were such places in my father’s time, were there?”

“Nor for years later,” said Carsdale, smiling. “So you like that part of the town? That’s well, for the pied-à-terre which I have in mind for you is just off Piccadilly—it is, in fact, in Berkeley Square itself. And as we may as well do all we can this afternoon, so that you can complete the settling-down business and feel yourself at home, we’ll just step into my car and be off. By the by, Shrewsbury—well drop the formal ‘Misters,’ eh?—you’ll want a car of your own, and you must let me get one for you, but that can wait a day or two.”

It seemed to Richard Shrewsbury, unaccustomed as he was to modern life in a great capital, that it was a very easy matter to do things in London—all that he and Carsdale did that afternoon was done so smoothly, so pleasantly, and to the accompaniment of such courtesy and attention from the various people with whom they came in contact. But he was all unconscious of the fact that Mr. Carsdale, who had a large and peculiar acquaintance with all manner of folk who had things to sell and profits to make, had already visited every one of the people to whom he took his young friend, and had made them keenly alive to the knowledge that Richard was a gentleman, not of prospects, but of certainties—the certainty, at any rate, of being in actual possession at that moment of a cash capital of three hundred thousand pounds. And being unconscious, he took all the politeness that was shown him as being characteristic of the London tradesman, and his spirits rose, and he felt that London was a good place to live in, and saw it through rosy spectacles—which was, when one comes to think of it, an excellent thing for him, seeing that first impressions are naturally apt to give a good tone and colour to life.

“This suite of rooms,” remarked Carsdale, as they stepped out of an elevator in a modern mansion which some enterprising builder had erected on all the latest principles in a corner of Berkeley Square which had once been occupied by an old-fashioned house—“this suite of rooms which I am going to show you, Shrewsbury, is one which I can confidently recommend. It is neither too large nor too small: it is just what a young bachelor like yourself wants; it is just the place in which you will like to receive your friends. You don’t want a place in which to give dinner-parties, nor even to lunch people; nowadays, everybody entertains anywhere but in their own houses. It is well and beautifully and artistically furnished; all that is necessary is to embellish it with your own pictures and your own books and your own objects of vertu: I can tell you how to buy and to choose all these. It is quiet; it is central for that part of the world in which you will have to live; and the yearly rental for a well-equipped suite, is most reasonable. It is a lucky thing that it should be to let—and here is Mr. Messenger, the agent who has the letting of it.”

Mr. Messenger, an elaborately-dressed gentleman, who might have belonged to the highest order of the peerage (as represented in the popular journals of fiction), awaited Mr. Carsdale and his young friend in the corridor which led to the suite of rooms of which the elder man had been speaking; near him, in an attitude of respectful attention, stood a clean-shaven, neat-figured person who was also very well and soberly dressed, and carried a silk hat in his hand, but whose garments, well cut as they were, seemed to suggest in themselves that they were carefully designed as a sort of livery. This individual greeted Carsdale and Richard with a deep bow and a composed smile; Carsdale threw him an off-hand nod.

“See you presently, Kedgin,” he said. “Now, Mr. Messenger, this is Mr. Richard Shrewsbury, and we’ll look round the place at once. I’ve just been telling Mr. Shrewsbury that he’s lucky to find such a convenient suite vacant. Let’s see—Lord Verdimere had it last, hadn’t he?”

“For three years, Mr. Carsdale,” replied Mr. Messenger, in grave and measured tones. “And his lordship would have retained it but for the fact that his regiment was ordered to India for an indefinite period. Since his lordship left, however, Mr. Carsdale, the suite has been entirely re-decorated, and the reception-rooms have been fully re-furnished, and I think I may assure Mr. Shrewsbury that—for a suite of modest dimensions, you know, Mr. Carsdale, and at a moderate rental—he could find nothing better in London. This way, gentlemen.”

It did not occur to Richard at the moment that what is one man’s notion of modesty and moderation is not another’s; he was wholly absorbed in examining and admiring the place which he was invited to settle down in and to call home. It seemed to him to be a very palatial suite of apartments: quite a little house in itself, he thought, except that everything was on one level, and that there were no stairs. He listened and observed in silence while Mr. Messenger pointed out the features and advantages of the place. There was a properly-sized entrance hall. There were two excellent reception-rooms, each with an outlook on Berkeley Square. There were two equally excellent bedrooms; there was a bathroom with all the latest inventions and improvements. The accommodation for domestics was arranged, said the agent, on the most modern principles, and was designed for a married couple, who were provided with a bedroom, a sitting-room, a kitchen (to which was added a butler’s pantry and wine cellar), the usual offices, and a separate entrance. Everything was perfect and fully approved as regards sanitation, ventilation, and the supply of water. The suite was fitted throughout with electric light, and there was a first-class and luxurious supply of linen, glass, and china.

“But not, of course, silver and plate,” added Mr. Messenger. “Our tenants, naturally, supply their own silver and plate.”

“Oh, of course, of course!” said Carsdale. “Yes, of course.”

“And the rent,” concluded Mr. Messenger, softly, “the rent, as the suite stands, is one hundred and twenty guineas per calendar month. Or,” he added, with a bland smile, and an air of conferring a great favour, “we would say fifteen hundred pounds per annum—on the usual terms of a yearly tenancy, of course.”

“Very reasonable, very reasonable!” murmured Carsdale.

“You would advise me to take the suite on those terms?” asked Richard. “You know, of course, better than I do.”

“I should certainly advise it,” answered Carsdale. “You couldn’t do better. As I said, you’re fortunate in finding the place to let.”

Richard turned to Mr. Messenger with an old-fashioned bow.

“Very well,” he said. “I’ll take the suite, then, on those terms.”

Mr. Messenger also bowed and rubbed his hands.

“Thank you, sir,” he said. “You will not regret your bargain. Then you will bring Mr. Shrewsbury round, Mr. Carsdale, at your con——”

“We’ll come round, and sign the agreement in a few minutes,” said Carsdale. “And give you a cheque for the first quarter, too. I suppose you’ve got a cheque-book on you, Shrewsbury?” he added. “If you haven’t, I have—it’s all one.”

But Richard had a cheque-book on him, and made haste to say so, and Mr. Messenger departed with another bow, and Carsdale stepped out to the hall and called in the man whom they had left in the corridor. The man came in with a certain quiet assurance, in which confidence in himself seemed to be combined with the exact amount of proper respect due to a possible master, and as he drew up Carsdale waved his hands towards him in the fashion in which a seller might exhibit some thoroughly good article to a likely purchaser.

“Now, this, Shrewsbury,” he said, “this is William Kedgin. I have known him for several years. He is a thoroughly honest, reliable man. He is a first-class valet, a thoroughly experienced gentleman’s servant. He has valeted several gentlemen of more or less note. He has a wife who is a capital housekeeper, and who can be guaranteed—with some assistance from him—to keep your suite of rooms in apple-pie order; she is, moreover, equally capable of sending in just what you would like a breakfast to be if you give a bachelor breakfast party. You can safely leave your clothes, your linen, your wine, in Kedgin’s hands; your breakfast, your dusting, your cleaning-up, in Mrs. Kedgin’s. And your terms are, I think, Kedgin, four pounds a week for the two of you, and find yourselves, eh?”

“Quite right, sir,” replied Kedgin in a quiet, assured voice. “Our usual terms, sir. If Mr. Shrewsbury would wish to see our testimonials, Mr. Carsdale——”

“I don’t think Mr. Shrewsbury need bother,” said Carsdale. “Mr. Shrewsbury can depend upon me.”

“Certainly, certainly,” said Richard, who had already conceived a very high opinion of Carsdale’s powers. “I shall be very glad to engage you on those terms,” he continued, turning to Kedgin.

“Thank you, sir,” replied Kedgin. “We shall do our best to give you complete satisfaction, sir. When would you wish us to enter upon our duties, sir?”

“Why, that’s just what I was going to speak of,” said Carsdale. “Look here, Shrewsbury, you may as well come in here at once. Let Kedgin go to the hotel, pay your bill, and bring your luggage here. I’m going to ask you to dine with me, so you’ll be fixed up for the evening, and Kedgin will have all ready for you when you turn in at night. That’s your wisest plan.”

And Richard acquiesced readily, and they gave Kedgin his orders, and went off to Mr. Messenger’s office, and there Richard signed a document which Carsdale saved him the trouble of reading and drew his first cheque in London, and subsequently walked out with his guide and mentor, feeling that he was now an actual denizen of the great city.

“You made things very easy for me,” he said, in the fulness of his gratitude. “I really don’t know what I should have done without you!”

“Oh! you’ll soon learn how to do things for yourself,” laughed Carsdale. “The in and outs of London life are quickly learned by young men like you. Now, we’ve plenty of time before evening, and I’ll introduce you to three absolutely necessary people—the tailor, the bootmaker, and the builder of shirts and such-like. And perhaps we’ll throw in the hatter, and you’d better see about fitting yourself out with what silver you want for your table. They’re all together here in Bond Street or Saville Row—come along!”

They wound up the afternoon’s proceedings with a quiet but remarkably good dinner at a certain establishment, whereto one could repair, said Carsdale, without the trouble of dressing, and by the time they had finished their coffee the elder man had formed a very accurate estimate of the younger one’s powers and capabilities. And Carsdale was feeling very satisfied when he played his next move in the game.

“You won’t care for a music-hall or a theatre on this, your first night,” he said. “What do you say to having a quiet cigarette, and a talk at Mrs. Walsingham’s flat? She’s a lonely woman, and she’ll be glad to see us.”

Richard’s face betrayed his ready acceptance of this proposition. And Carsdale smiled as he turned away to reach for his hat.

CHAPTER VI
MRS. WALSINGHAM AT HOME

It was one of the characteristic features of the daily life at Leverton & Carsdale’s that only two people in the place kept regular hours. Mr. Barclay Leverton, when he was living, was a fairly methodical man, and might be depended upon in the matter of finding him at his desk by ten and still there at five, and when he made appointments he usually kept them. But Carsdale was uncertain, erratic, irresponsible, a very ignis fatuus of a man upon occasion. He would sometimes startle the charwoman by walking, or, rather, rushing, in before eight o’clock; he would sometimes remain at his desk until midnight; sometimes he would stay away from Abbotsbury House for days together; he was utterly undependable as regards anything but appointments which particularly appealed to him, and it was quite in accordance with his way of doing things to bring an unprofitable caller into his room, bid him be seated, and then go out, to return hours later, or not at all. And just as independent in the matter of hours was Mrs. Walsingham. She was supposed to come at ten and to leave at six; she arrived when she liked and departed when she pleased, and Miss Rousby, typist, and Master Griffkin, office-boy, envied and hated her because of her liberty. For they were required to be in attendance at nine-thirty and to remain until six, and it not seldom happened that Griffkin was further subjected to the indignity of having to carry urgent messages somewhere just when he should have been exchanging his livery of blue and silver for the humbler mufti in which he came and went from the parental roof-tree in Kennington.

“Seems to me,” observed Griffkin, late in the afternoon which witnessed Richard Shrewsbury’s introduction to London by Mr. John Carsdale, “seems to me that there’s two, and two only, as runs this here establishment, and no error!”

He was folding and stamping circulars, which Miss Rousby was wearily addressing, and he looked at the typist with an expression which gave and demanded sympathy.

“Who?” inquired Miss Rousby, apathetically. “Who?”

“Who? Why, me and you,” answered Griffkin. “Carsdale, he’s in and out like one of them figures in a weather-glass—you know, where there’s an old man one side, and an old woman the other—and he don’t do nothing but talk, as I can see of, and as for her”—here he jerked a scornful thumb at the door through which Mrs. Walsingham had departed at five o’clock—“I should like to know what she does except twist them shiners round her fingers, and make her silk gown crackle. Yah! As for Leverton, he was a bit of a grafter, but he’s dead and gone.”

“Yes,” assented Miss Rousby. “Yes—he’s gone. The last place I was in, there was a principal died while I was there. He left us all ten pounds each to buy mourning with.”

“Garn!” exclaimed Griffkin. “What, ten quid to buy black with!”

“It’s a fact,” answered Miss Rousby. “Of course, we didn’t lay out the whole of the ten pounds on mourning. I bought a crêpe gown and a new hat and a new pair of shoes—two pounds I spent on that lot—and I put the rest in the Post-Office. P’r’aps Mr. Leverton’ll have left us something.”

“Oh, yes!” said Griffkin, scornfully. “Yes, I don’t think! Ain’t I been here a whole year, and never had a rise? ’Tween you and me, now that Leverton’s dropped out, I shall seriously consider my position. ’Cause why? ’Cause in my opinion, and if you ask me, Carsdale and Her’ll go into partnership. And I don’t know about Her—I ain’t so keen about retaining my post if she’s going to be a principal.”

“She couldn’t be much more of a principal than she is now,” said Miss Rousby, dismally surveying the pile of circulars at her side, “and she does more and more as she likes every day. When I first came here she’d have stopped and helped me to get these prospectuses off, instead of which she goes peacocking out at five o’clock. I shall be ten minutes late.”

“Yes, and your young man a-waiting at the top of the street,” remarked Griffkin. “However, I’ll do yer a good turn, Miss Rousby. I’ll give him the office, see, when I run to catch the six post.”

Mrs. Walsingham had seen good reason to leave business at five o’clock that evening, for Carsdale, in spite of his busy adventures in the neighbourhood of Bond Street, had found time to ring her up on the telephone, and to warn her that he meant to bring Richard round to call upon her after dinner, and she desired to have a little time in which to prepare for the visit. Moreover, she was one of those rare women who understand the virtues of proper and regular meals, and she never allowed anything to interfere with her arrangements in that respect. If, therefore, she was required to give an extra half-hour to her evening toilette, she must take half an hour out of her working afternoon. That was a proper adjustment of things—and so she repaired to her favourite restaurant in Soho, where she was so well known that a certain table was sacred to her, and she ate and drank calmly and reflected philosophically, and eventually repaired to her flat to don her prettiest gown in honour of the young gentleman who possessed three hundred thousand pounds in solid cash.

Mrs. Walsingham’s flat was situated in one of the vast buildings which recent years have seen spring into existence in the neighbourhood that lies between Bloomsbury and the Tottenham Court Road. People who were privileged to enjoy Mrs. Walsingham’s friendship and acquaintance considered it the very model of what a flat should be which serves to house a single lady and her maid, and were apt to wax enthusiastic over its arrangement and its simple luxury of appointment. For Mrs. Walsingham possessed considerable ideas in the way of taste and refinement; she had definite notions about such matters as colour schemes, about such ordinary things as floor carpets and window curtains; she knew a good print from a bad one; she was careful never to overload her walls, and her book-cases were filled with excellent specimens of the binder’s art; like herself, her surroundings were dainty and elegant; the light, whether natural or artificial, was always properly graduated in her rooms, and one came away from them feeling as if one had spent an hour in an ancient church behind windows of mellowed glass. And Mr. John Carsdale said as much to Richard Shrewsbury as they drove away from the quiet restaurant at which they had dined.

“When I have had a hard day, and want peace, I always go to see Mrs. Walsingham,” he remarked. “Mrs. Walsingham is one of those clever women who can entertain a man without talking his head off.”

“She looks clever,” said Richard, who was at loss for words and accordingly took refuge in a safe observation.

“One of the cleverest women in London,” said Mr. Carsdale, with conviction. “One of the very few women who understand finance. I would rather trust Mrs. Walsingham’s judgment on a big money affair, than that of most men in the City. And I know a good lot of ’em!”

Richard conquered his shyness and made a desperate plunge.

“Is there a—shall we meet a Mr. Walsingham?” he asked.

Carsdale shook his head and assumed an expression of sympathy.

“Ah, no!” he answered. “Mrs. Walsingham is a widow. Hers is a sad story—most romantic, really. Early marriage—very early, much too early!—runaway marriage, in fact, with a handsome, fascinating man—a great traveller and globe-trotter, Walsingham. Got an insane idea into his head that he could penetrate to some extraordinary place somewhere between Arabia and Persia—ass enough to try it and to take his young wife with him. Got into a row with natives—very domineering and pertinacious man, Walsingham—with sad result—shot, murdered, in fact, in her presence. She escaped only through friendly offices of powerful Sheik, who rallied his men round him and got her down to coast on board British man-of-war in Persian Gulf. Came home naturally distracted, and turned to business, and especially to financial matters, as a relief, you know. Five years ago, that is—little more than a girl now, but as I say, one of the keenest and most astute women in London.”

Richard was still pondering over this romantic story when they arrived at Mrs. Walsingham’s flat to be admitted by a very smart maid and received by Mrs. Walsingham herself in a tiny drawing-room, the light of which was carefully contrived to show off the hostess’s charms and evening toilette to the best advantage. He looked about him as Carsdale plunged into voluble accounts of their doings during the afternoon, and determined that he would ask Mrs. Walsingham’s advice about buying books and pictures. Much as he trusted Carsdale, he felt instinctively that the lady’s taste was superior to the gentleman’s, and he began to understand what Carsdale meant when he said that he visited her in quest of peace after a hard day’s work.

Mrs. Walsingham, it was very evident, knew how to entertain guests who happened to be of the opposite sex. She had a cabinet of eminently choice cigarettes, of many brands and all of the most superfine quality, and as soon as Carsdale and Richard were comfortably seated, the smart maid (who was almost as pretty as her mistress and nearly as clever looking) brought in whiskey and soda. And Richard was quick to see that Carsdale was very much at home, and he began to wonder if he was aspiring to fill the place of the late adventurous and much-to-be-pitied Mr. Walsingham, and finally (though he could not for the life of him have told why) decided that he was not, and he listened to his rattling tongue and to Mrs. Walsingham’s lazy but shrewd comments, and came to the conclusion that all this was very pleasant, and that Mrs. Walsingham was the prettiest woman he had ever seen in his life. And at the end of half an hour in came the smart maid with the quiet announcement that somebody was asking for Mr. Carsdale over the telephone.

Carsdale uttered an anathema with an emphasis which sounded very real, and went out. He presently returned, making a face expressive of disgust.

“I’ll have to go,” he said. “That’s Robinson. He’s just come in from Paris, and he’s waiting for me at the Charing Cross Hotel, and, of course, has been ringing me up all over the place. Sorry Mrs. Walsingham, but it’s of the highest importance, as you know. All the same, there’s no need to drag you away, Shrewsbury.”

“Of course not,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “And I think it’s very foolish of you to let people know where you’re likely to be found.”

Carsdale muttered something about the necessities of business, and with a hasty adieu and an admonition to Richard to be sure to remember where he lived, hurried off. And Mrs. Walsingham sighed, as if deprecating such ridiculous energy at that hour of the evening, and she settled herself in her cushions and lighted another cigarette, and turned to her guest with an expression which seemed in some subtle fashion to suggest that now that the bustling Carsdale was gone they could enjoy a little peace.

“And how do you like London?” she asked with the indulgence of an elderly person who asks a child how its new toy pleases it.

“Very much,” answered Richard, quite simply. “But—I don’t realize it yet. It’s so big. You see, until I came here, I never saw a bigger town than Port-of-Spain.”

“And that is—where?” asked Mrs. Walsingham.

“It is the capital of Trinidad, where our sugar plantations were,” answered Richard. “It is a fine town, but I suppose you could put it into London—oh, I don’t know how many times. And at first, as I knew nobody here, I thought I should be desperately lonely.”

“And now?” said Mrs. Walsingham.

“I don’t see how one ought to be lonely, when there are so many people,” said Richard.

“One can be as lonely amongst all these millions as if one were living in—in the Arctic Regions,” observed Mrs. Walsingham. “Oh, I know it—I myself, know very few people. I was delighted that Mr. Carsdale brought you to-night—do come again. Is it really true that you don’t know anybody in London?”

“Quite true,” replied Richard. “At least, I know a few cricketers who came out to play in the West Indies—I dare say I shall meet them somewhere or other. No, I don’t know anybody. But there’s a man coming home—he’ll be here in another month—whom I know pretty well. I’m looking forward awfully keenly to seeing him—he’s a fine chap—Burgoyne, the explorer, you know.”

“Oh, yes!” said Mrs. Walsingham. “I saw something about him in the evening paper. He’d been lost, and he’s turned up again, hasn’t he? So you know him?”

“He stopped with us once for a week or two—four years ago,” answered Richard. “He’s a great man—I saw the paper, too, and I was awfully glad to hear he was alive: everybody thought he’d never turn up again. I shall look him up as soon as ever he lands—I don’t think there’ll be much difficulty about finding him, because he’ll be quite famous.”

“That will very nice for you,” said Mrs. Walsingham.

Then she cleverly turned the conversation to Richard himself and drew him out to talk of his likes and his wishes, of his life in Trinidad and of such modest ambitions as he had, and she was so sympathetic and so understanding, and so subtly clever in saying the right word and suggesting proper appreciation, that the youngster was drawn to speak freely and unreservedly, and eventually went away in a seventh heaven of satisfaction, having already promised to come and see Mrs. Walsingham whenever he liked, and arranged to take her out to dinner and to the theatre as soon as ever his tailor had got his dress-clothes ready. And when he had gone Mrs. Walsingham mixed herself a whiskey-and-soda and lighted a cigarette and became very thoughtful as she contemplated herself in the mirror.

“So he knows Burgoyne!” she mused. “And—they’re sure to meet, sure. And—then? But there’s a whole month yet, and a month is—a month.”

CHAPTER VII
CARSDALE’S CAREFULNESS

One of Richard Shrewsbury’s first thoughts as he drove across Waterloo Bridge on the morning of his arrival in London had been a disquieting, if not an alarming one. He knew nobody; he did not know what to do with himself; how would he pass his time? It was true that he came from a clime wherein natural conditions incline men to indolence and lassitude from their birth, but he was young and the English blood in him demanded liveliness and action, and he was concerned to think at that moment that he saw no immediate outlet for his vitality. Until his meeting with John Carsdale he had felt as an enterprising bee might feel which has got into a bottle, and can see mighty possibilities through its crystal walls without a clear notion of how to get at them.

But after that first eventful and exciting day in town, Richard realized that however lonely and friendless a young man may be when he comes to London for the first time, he will not long be so, nor will he be long unoccupied, if he happens to have wealth at his hourly disposal. He was astonished to find how very busy he became at once. There were such a lot of things to attend to, and they were all of a pleasant nature. It was great fun to settle down to housekeeping; to dispose and re-arrange his rooms to his own liking; he even found an engrossing novelty in ordering his breakfasts. For a fortnight he was much occupied with the folk who were busily engaged in beautifying and adorning his outer man; the result of their labours, under Carsdale’s counsel, was that the young gentleman found himself one of the best-dressed men about town and that Kedgin had a mighty wardrobe to superintend and keep in order. And there were more intellectual matters than clothes and shirts and boots and hats and gloves to consider and deal with—aided by Carsdale and advised by Mrs. Walsingham, he bought pictures and books and old china, and they took care that all he bought was good. Accordingly, his walls were hung with excellent examples, and his open cases were filled with standard works in fine bindings, and as he had a natural love for good reading and a sympathetic, if untrained eye for sound Art, he was well pleased; as to the cabinets of china which Mrs. Walsingham arranged for him in his drawing-room, he did not understand them, but Carsdale had impressed upon him that nothing is so good for a young man as the cultivation of good taste in such things, and Richard believed him and viewed his cups and saucers with great awe. After all, it was a delightful thing to be young, and to have money, and to surround oneself with the evidences of luxury.

That it was easy to spend money when you have it to spend, Richard discovered very quickly indeed. Carsdale told him that he might just as well fit himself up thoroughly while he was about it: with his income there was no need for him to stint himself. He must have a couple of horses; Carsdale knew exactly where they could be bought and where they could be kept at livery after they were bought, and Richard was presently seen in the Row, where shrewd eyes valued his mounts at nothing less than two hundred guineas apiece. Also, he must have a motor-car; Carsdale knew where to get that, too, and got it—a beautiful car, which cost about three times as much as the two hunters when it was finished and fitted with all the proper luxuries. Then it was necessary to engage a chauffeur; Carsdale found the very man, and Richard hired him at a comfortable weekly wage. He had now got an abode, and servants, and horses, and a motor-car—he must now have his club, said Carsdale, so that he would have somewhere to turn when he felt to need change from whatever he was doing. And Carsdale got him into two clubs, both of a social nature, but one rather more inclined to sport and lightness than the other; it was always an excellent idea, said Carsdale, to have at any rate two clubs, and of a different nature, so that if you got bored in one of them, you could step round for relief to its contrast. And Richard accepted all that his mentor advised, and he was well pleased and much occupied with his new duties and his amusements during those first weeks in England, and he considered Carsdale a veritable walking compendium of all requisite knowledge.

Carsdale let the young gentleman settle down before he entered upon the subject of investments. He knew where Richard’s three hundred thousand pounds lay, and that its owner had it at immediate disposal. It was in the hands of a firm of very solemn and serious private bankers, and Carsdale was well aware that the principals would keep an eye on their youthful client’s goings-on. And so, when at last he gave up a whole morning to Richard in his private room at Abbotsbury House, in order to advise on the question of what should be done with the Shrewsbury fortune, he had no wild-cat schemes to propose, no daring adventure to undertake. In short, he had already arranged for the investment of a quarter of a million in certain securities, a list of which he had carefully prepared. He went over that list with Richard, item by item, detailing and explaining. Richard understood little of details or explanations; what he did understand was that from the two hundred and fifty thousand pounds thus invested in what Mr. Carsdale called gilt-edged securities, he would derive an annual income of fifteen thousand pounds.

“Which, in your present bachelor state of life, is quite enough for you to spend,” commented Carsdale. “When you contemplate matrimony we may think of increasing it. But you won’t spend it.”

“Spend fifteen thousand a year!” exclaimed Richard. “I should think not. Why, I’ve got an exact account of every penny I’ve spent since I came, and—oh, I couldn’t spend fifteen thousand a year.”

“Good boy!” said Carsdale, with a dry cough. “Don’t try to spend it. Some accomplishments, Shrewsbury, are very easily learned. However, I have noted, with great satisfaction, that you have no great desire to own race-horses, frequent gaming-houses, or to cultivate the society of young women of the musical comedy order. Keep off all these, my son, and you will do well. And now, back to business. You are not going to invest your quarter of a million in these securities solely on my advice, though, as I tell you, I have arranged everything for you, because you will so invest it. But first—have you ever yet called on your bankers?”

“Never. I’ve never had time,” replied Richard.

“Very good—but they’ll no doubt be delighted to see you,” said Carsdale. “Now follow my instructions. Take this list in your hand. Get into your car—go down to the City—see your bankers. Tell them that on the advice of your friend, Mr. John Carsdale, of Norfolk Street, you are about to make these investments at once. Ask them if they approve. Tell them that if they do, the transactions will be completed forthwith, and that you will subsequently hand over your securities to them for safe keeping. Be off, now, and then come back to me with your report.”

And Richard went down to the City, and saw two grave, yet much interested gentlemen, who appeared to know nothing of Mr. John Carsdale of Norfolk Street, but were at one in expressing high approval of the manner in which he proposed to invest a quarter of a million of their customer’s money. For everything that figured on Carsdale’s list was thoroughly good and sound, and they were rejoiced to know that the young man was not going to be led away into wild-goose chases, or persuaded to set up a racing establishment, and they told him frankly that he could not do better than follow his friend’s advice.

“Just so,” said Carsdale when Richard went back with his report. “That shows what sensible men they are. Now we will get all this put through, and then you will be fully settled down and know what your income is, and all will be plain sailing, so long as you never spend more than nineteen and elevenpence in every pound.”

“What about the rest of the money?” said Richard, who was beginning to feel a faint excitement in financial matters.

“What rest?” asked Carsdale.

“There’s a lot more at the bankers,” replied Richard. “They had three hundred and seven thousand pounds of mine when I came. I’ve spent about three thousand since I came, one way or another, so there’s still about fifty thousand and more in their hands when these investments are made. What’s to be done with that?”

“Oh, leave it as it is for a while,” answered Carsdale. “It is always well to have a good cash balance at your bankers. You’re all right for the time being. But if you like you can put ten thousand in my hands—to play with.”

“To what?” asked Richard.

“To play with,” repeated Carsdale. “I constantly know of small affairs which are worth putting a thousand or two into, even a few hundreds into, for a while—sometimes one can make as much as fifty per cent. on such transactions. Leave ten thousand with me, and we’ll see what comes of it at the end of the year.”

And Richard agreed readily, for he regarded Carsdale as something like a past master in finance, and that afternoon Carsdale paid in ten thousand pounds to his own private banking account. He was just then in clover, for he had received handsome commissions from all the people to whom he had brought business in connection with Richard, and he had wound up his partnership with the late Barclay Leverton’s representatives on terms which were eminently satisfactory to himself, and he saw a bright future immediately in front of him. He was now whole and sole master of the suite of offices at the top of Abbotsbury House; the name of Leverton had disappeared from the swinging doors and the roll of tenants in the hall, and Frances came no longer to look into books and letters and ask questions which had sometimes been inconvenient to answer. Carsdale was now busier than ever; he began to develop a new class of business, and the smaller fry of his clients found it increasingly difficult to see him. Even Mrs. Walsingham found it a little puzzling when she tried to reckon up his courses.

“I don’t quite know what you’re after,” she said one day when she was closeted with him in his office. “Since young Shrewsbury came on the scene you seem to have developed a desire for severe respectability in your transactions.”

“Quite right,” said Carsdale. “Young Shrewsbury was precisely what I wanted. I did myself more good by sending him down to his bankers with that list of securities than you can realize. That action conferred distinction and credit on me. Why, I met one of them at a meeting at the Cannon Street Hotel the other day, and he actually condescended to compliment me on the excellent advice I had given to a young and inexperienced gentleman, and, in parting gave me two fingers to shake! What do you think of that, Sylvie?”

“I suppose you want to increase in virtue and respectability until some big wig in the City stops to shake hands—not fingers—with you in full view of all Lombard Street,” replied Mrs. Walsingham. “All right—so long as it pays.”

“It pays,” said Carsdale. “You can’t extend the ægis of protection to a youngster who possesses three hundred thousand pounds and doesn’t spend half his income without benefiting yourself. I tell you, it’s a valuable asset to me to be in a position to show with what care, perspicuity, zealous attention to his safeguards and interests I have husbanded the youngster’s harvest!”

“Picking up a few stray gleanings here and there,” said Mrs. Walsingham, with a silvery laugh.

“You’ve as many chances in the harvest field as I have,” laughed Carsdale. “He seems to be in constant touch with you.”

In that Carsdale was right. Richard had quickly fallen into the habit of repairing to Mrs. Walsingham regularly. He made excuses at first; he wanted advice about where to hang a picture; how to have a set of books bound; how to do this, that, and the other; presently he took it quite as a matter of course that he should see her every day. He was always taking her to dinner, to the theatre, to the opera. When the motor-car came into his life he began to take her out into the country on Sundays; at first Carsdale went with them; later, he excused himself. And without knowing how or why, Richard became Mrs. Walsingham’s shadow, and the motor-car was often seen carrying them both away from the door of Abbotsbury House at hours in the afternoon whereat Mrs. Walsingham, according to the ideas of Miss Rousby and Mr. Griffkin, should still have been at her desk.

“But Carsdale, he don’t say a word,” remarked Griffkin. “It don’t matter to him whether she goes at five or four.”

“The question is, dare he say a word?” observed Miss Rousby with sinister significance. “Some people in this world can do what they like—they can twist other people round their fingers as—as——”

“As she twists them shiners round her fingers,” suggested Griffkin. “You’re right!”

In this fashion, and in these pursuits Richard’s first few weeks in London passed away and saw him settle into a luxurious and easy-going existence. Of no particular vices, of no vast ambition, generous of nature, and a little inclined to let things come and go as they would, he had no fault to find with his lot. It was pleasant and placid.

And then, one morning, as he was chatting with Mrs. Walsingham and Carsdale in Carsdale’s private room, Griffkin opened the door, and announced Captain Ralph Burgoyne.

CHAPTER VIII
A PLEDGE REDEEMED

If there had been another person present in Carsdale’s office, quick-eyed enough to have taken in everything at a glance, he would have seen that Griffkin’s announcement produced a different effect on each of the three people who heard it. Carsdale himself looked frankly astonished; Mrs. Walsingham, in spite of her sedulous training of herself, could not repress a slight start of surprise nor keep down a little heightening of colour. But Richard Shrewsbury jumped to his feet with an exclamation of boyish enthusiasm and made for the door.

“It’s Burgoyne!” he almost shouted. “Burgoyne, you know, the explorer! I told you about him, Mrs. Walsingham—he’s home sooner than they said. Don’t you know him, Carsdale?—shan’t I bring him in?”

“Bring Captain Burgoyne in by all means,” said Carsdale, rising. “I haven’t the pleasure of knowing him, but—what does the boy mean?” he continued, turning to Mrs. Walsingham as Richard impatiently dashed out of the room. “Does he know him?”

“He knew him in Trinidad,” answered Mrs. Walsingham, rapidly. “Burgoyne stayed with his father. I fancy,” she said, glancing at the door, and speaking still more rapidly and in a low voice, “I fancy that Burgoyne came to see Leverton. Leverton once brought him in here about three years ago, when you were away. Try to find out what he wants.”

Carsdale was quick enough to catch some hidden meaning in Mrs. Walsingham’s tone. He nodded his head sharply.

“All right,” he said. “Don’t go. Let’s see, this chap has just come home from South America, eh? I remember.”

Outside, Richard was vigorously shaking the hand of a big, bronzed man who looked at him with good-humoured surprise. Also he was jerking out boyish exclamations of delight. The big man laughed.

“Bless me, so it’s really young Dick!” he said when he could put a word in. “Well, you’ve grown, youngster. But what are you doing here?”

“I live in London, of course,” said Richard. “I—oh, I’ll tell you all about it afterwards. By Jove!—I am glad to see you, Burgoyne—but I didn’t know you’d landed—I was going to run down to Southampton to meet you. Come in, do!”

“What, are these your offices?” said Burgoyne, looking about him. “I came to see Mr. Barclay Leverton.”

“Mr. Leverton is dead, but here is my friend Mr. Carsdale, who can tell you anything you want to know,” said Richard, dragging the explorer through the outer office, where Miss Rousby and Griffkin, quite aware of his identity, stared at him with veneration. “Come and be introduced to him—and to my friend Mrs. Walsingham, too.”

Captain Burgoyne suffered himself to be led into Carsdale’s room and to be subjected to the ceremonies of introduction, and he took a chair and looked around him with a smile.

“This is a little surprising,” he said. “I did not expect to meet an old friend here. I came to see Mr. Leverton, and I am sorry to hear that he is dead. Did it happen—recently?”

“Mr. Leverton has been dead six weeks,” replied Carsdale. “He had been ill for some weeks, but he died very suddenly at last. Can I do anything for you, Captain Burgoyne? I was in partnership with Mr. Leverton. But perhaps your business with him was of a private nature?”

“Why, it was,” answered Captain Burgoyne “Yes——oh, yes, it was a private affair. The fact was, he had certain property of mine in his hands, and I—well, I want it.”

“Oh, yes?” said Carsdale. He was wondering to what the visitor could possibly refer, and he found difficulty in surmising. “Mr. Leverton, of course, had affairs of which I knew nothing,” he remarked.

“Just so,” responded Captain Burgoyne. “Perhaps his executors——”

“You had better call on his solicitor,” said Carsdale, who saw no object in withholding information which any one could acquire without difficulty. “Mr. Septimus Winch, 250A, New Square, Lincoln’s Inn. I’ll write it down for you. Mr. Winch removed all Leverton’s private belongings from his room here some weeks ago.”

“Ah, thanks—I’ll step around there,” said Captain Burgoyne, taking the slip of paper which Carsdale handed to him. He rose and glanced at Richard with a smile. “Where shall I find you again, Dick?” he asked.

“I’m coming out with you,” said Richard. “I say, look here—I’m going to fix up a dinner now that you’ve come home, Burgoyne—for the four of us here, eh? What day will suit you?”

“I must look at my diary,” said Burgoyne, with a smile at Carsdale. “I’m pretty busy.”

“Shrewsbury forgets that you’re a public character,” said Carsdale. “He’s not the only man that has a claim on you.”

“Well, he shall monopolize me for an hour, at any rate,” said Burgoyne, laughing. He took Richard’s arm as they went out, and gave it a friendly squeeze. “And what are you doing here, youngster?” he asked. “I never expected to set eyes on you, you know!”

“My father’s dead, and so I came to England, and here I am,” answered Richard. “I’ve got rooms in Berkeley Square, and you must come and see me—come to breakfast to-morrow.”

“Yes, I think I can do that,” replied Burgoyne. “Ah, and so your good father’s dead, Dick. He was a fine man, and a kind host. And of course you’ve come in for all the money, and I hope it’s in safe hands.”

“Safe as—as the Bank of England,” answered Richard shortly. “Carsdale, there, invested it, and my bankers say there couldn’t be better investments.”

“That’s right,” said Burgoyne. “Well, I’m come into a fortune, too—got the news of it at Lima. That’s why I came to seek Leverton. You never knew Leverton?”

“No, he died the very day I came here,” said Richard. “But my father did—they were old schoolfellows.”

“Leverton was a good chap,” remarked Burgoyne. “He was a member of a club to which I belonged till I went off. And he lent me five thousand pounds towards the expenses of my expedition—privately, you know. But I gave him as security a certain diamond necklace which has been in our family for a long time, and is said to have belonged to Maria Louisa, Napoleon’s Empress. And now that I’m a moneyed man, I want to repay that loan and get it back, though a diamond necklace is something of a white elephant to me. However, I suppose one ought not to lose old family possessions. Come with me, Dick, to see this lawyer.”

The clerk who carried Captain Burgoyne’s card to Mr. Winch returned quickly to say that his principal would see Captain Burgoyne at once, and he ushered the callers with great reverence to Mr. Winch’s room. And Richard, closely following the famous explorer, saw an old gentleman standing in a quaint room, and at his side a young lady in deep mourning, and he perceived that both regarded Captain Burgoyne with deep interest.

“My dear sir!” exclaimed Mr. Winch. “My dear sir! I am delighted to see you, and I can guess the object of your visit, which is most fortunately timed. This lady, my dear Captain Burgoyne, is the daughter of our late friend, Mr. Barclay Leverton.”

Richard pricked up his ears. He suddenly remembered with a feeling of deep shame, that he had completely forgotten to send his condolences to the Leverton family, even to send flowers to lay on the coffin of his father’s old friend. He had meant to do both, but in the bustle and hurry of those first days in London, he had forgotten to do either. Even now he was quite in ignorance of what family Barclay Leverton had left, for neither Carsdale nor Mrs. Walsingham ever spoke of the dead man or his belongings. But here, at any rate, was Leverton’s daughter, and he looked at her with interest, and all the more closely because she herself was looking at Burgoyne. And presently he found himself being introduced to her, and he was conscious of becoming very shy—and after that he was relegated to the shades, for the old lawyer and the young lady and the explorer began to talk business.

“My dear sir,” said Mr. Winch, who seemed to be particularly delighted to see Captain Burgoyne, “I may save time by telling you that Miss Leverton and myself are fully aware of the transaction which took place between her father and yourself. I recently heard of your own good fortune, and I don’t suppose that I am wrong when I say that I gather you have called for your historic necklace.”

“Quite right, sir,” answered Burgoyne. “And—incidentally—to pay my debt. I wish I could have paid it to Mr. Leverton,” he added, with a quick glance at Frances, “but—he knew I was greatly obliged to him.”

Frances gave the explorer a grateful look.

“And my father was very anxious that you should have your necklace back again in safety, Captain Burgoyne,” she said. “He took particular pains, only the night before his death, to let me know what he wished done. I should like Captain Burgoyne to see the memoranda,” she continued, turning to Mr. Winch. “They will show him what my father’s intentions were.”

“Of course, of course,” said the solicitor. “Yes, my dear sir, although the time for repayment of my late client’s loan to you is almost expired, your property would have been safe for at least another year. The necklace is deposited at my bank, Captain Burgoyne, and I will send my managing clerk for it at once. In the meantime, here are the memoranda which Miss Leverton speaks of—the notes are in her handwriting in that paper, and in my late client’s in the other. You see what his intentions were?”

Captain Burgoyne saw, and made a graceful acknowledgment to the dead man’s daughter, begging her to accept the thanks which he would have given to her father had he been alive. And then he handed over a cheque to Mr. Winch, and presently the managing clerk came back from the bank with the sealed parcel which Mr. Winch and Frances had deposited there. Burgoyne was for dropping it carelessly into his pocket, but Mr. Winch loudly protested against such an unbusiness-like course—that, he said, would never do; Captain Burgoyne must see that his valuable property was safe and sound. So the parcel was undone, and the diamond necklace brought to light, and Mr. Winch entreated its owner to bestow it in an inner pocket, and to keep a jealous hold on it, lest any of the light-fingered gentry should steal it from him.

“For I have no doubt, my dear sir,” he added, in his mysteriously confidential manner, “I have no doubt that the object which you so lightly handle is worth a good deal more than the amount which you have just paid to me, quite apart from its historical associations, eh?”

“Oh, I believe so,” answered Burgoyne. “I have always been led to understand so, at any rate.”

Then he began to make his adieux, once more thanking Frances on her father’s behalf, and he and Richard prepared to depart. But it turned out that Miss Leverton and Mr. Winch were just then going out, too, and they all went down the stairs together, and, as luck would have it, Richard found himself at the girl’s side. And conquering his shyness with a violent effort, he turned and addressed her.

“I was so sorry to hear of your father’s death,” he said abruptly. “Awfully sorry!”

Frances turned and looked at him in surprise.

“You knew my father?” she said.

“No,” answered Richard. “No. But my father did—they were at school together. And when I came to England I wrote to your father as soon as I landed at Southampton, and I called at his office next morning—it was the very morning he died. And so, of course, I never saw him—and I’m awfully sorry.”

Frances looked at him in still greater surprise.

“You wrote to my father?” she said. “Then—who got the letter?”

“Oh!” said Richard. “Carsdale got the letter. It was, of course, more or less of a business letter, you know—a letter asking your father’s advice about investments and so on. And Carsdale’s been most kind—awfully kind—you know him, of course? He said at once that he’d like to do for me all that your father would have done for his old friend’s son, and so he has—I don’t know what I should have done without Carsdale. Nor without Mrs. Walsingham—I suppose you know her, too? But all the same, I was dreadfully disappointed not to see your father, and—I’m an awfully poor hand at saying anything, Miss Leverton, but mayn’t I call to—to see your mother, you know? Your father and mine were at school together—you must have heard him speak of Martin Shrewsbury?”

He had hurried breathlessly through the last part of the speech, for Mr. Winch was obviously waiting for the girl. And she was showing signs of obvious confusion, not to say perturbation, and there was a sudden flush on her face as she suddenly turned to Richard.

“I—very well—call at 7, Acacia Mansions, Maida Vale,” she said. “Call—this afternoon—at four—if you like. If not, to-morrow—any day.”

“To-day,” said Richard. “To-day!”

Then they parted, and Captain Burgoyne clapped his young friend’s shoulder, and carried him off to lunch at the Carlton.

CHAPTER IX
PLAIN SPEECH

In his own native island of Trinidad, Mr. Richard Shrewsbury had never given much more than a momentary attention to his garments, and he had wasted no time in considering the cut and the colour of his neckties. The conditions of climate, the fine carelessness of youth, had rendered him indifferent and superior on points of attire—a cool négligé in the matter of body raiment, a wide-spreading Panama in the way of protection for his head, had seemed to him all that was necessary. He had presented himself at Carsdale’s in a neat blue serge suit, which he himself was secretly very vain of, but which Carsdale immediately perceived to be of colonial origin. Doubts about the blue serge began to gather in Richard’s mind when he looked at other young men, seen in London streets; he grew uneasy when he examined Carsdale, who was always scrupulously dressed; he became frightened when Carsdale introduced him to a great professor of the sartorial art in Saville Row. When that gentleman had done with him, and had sent home to his Berkeley Square flat a consignment of clothing which made even Mr. William Kedgin open his well-accustomed eyes, Richard blossomed out into the most particular and even finicking young man about town. He was now as nice and as discriminating about his clothes, his neckties, his linen, his everything, as he had been careless in his previous stage of existence, and Kedgin at times found him hard to please because of his plethora of supply. The man who only possesses two suits of clothes can quickly make up his mind as to which of them he will wear; the possessor of two or three dozen suits feels the dressing of himself an important affair, to be decided and regulated by many other matters than the mere accidents of weather. Richard’s wardrobe was shamefully extensive, and there were enough neckties and gloves about him to stock a haberdasher’s shop, and there were occasions when Kedgin found it hard to decide on what was most suitable because there were so many articles to choose from.

But never, during those first few weeks of his descent upon London, had Richard been so particular, so hard to please, so intent upon being attired in the very pink of perfection, as he was on the afternoon of the day which restored Burgoyne to him. He had surprised the explorer by hurrying away as soon as lunch was over: he surprised Kedgin by the almost woman-like exigencies which he put upon the resources of his toilet and his wardrobe. Kedgin secretly wondered what his young master was after; when he had at last turned him out in splendour from top to toe, had followed him out to his motor-car, and had heard Richard bid the chauffeur drive to Acacia Mansions, Maida Vale, he indulged in a dry chuckle.

“Maida Vale, eh?” said Kedgin as the car drove off. “Ah, that’s where all the actresses live. So that’s it, is it? I thought he’d be up to that game sooner or later. He’ll begin to cultivate a taste in bookays, and chocolates, and diamond rings now. Ah!—musical comedy, no doubt.”

The unconscious and innocent object of these speculations sped on northwards, secretly hoping, as youths of his age will, that he was so attired as to make a good impression. He was aware that he was going to what had very recently been a house of mourning; he had therefore endeavoured to make his grandeur very sober and solemn. But he was very grand, in spite of his solemnity, and the hall-porter, and the lift-boy, and everybody who encountered him at Acacia Mansions, wondered what youthful nobleman or foreign prince had penetrated to Maida Vale from the haunts of fashion.

A youthful and round-eyed maid, in a freshly starched cap and apron, admitted Mr. Shrewsbury to Number Seven, and having duly worshipped his clothes and secretly admired his handsome and boyish face, ushered him into a sitting-room, wherein, seated at an eminently business-like looking desk, piled high with papers and books which appeared to suggest financial, rather than literary matters, sat Miss Frances Leverton, just then engaged in writing. Near her, in a wide window-place made bright with flowers, a young lady lay on a sofa; something in the pale face and bright eyes which she turned on him as he entered told Richard that she was either a confirmed invalid or a cripple.

Miss Leverton rose from her desk with all the composure of a business woman, and gave the visitor one hand, while she indicated a chair with the other. Then she introduced the girl on the sofa as Miss Bryce, and motioned Richard to sit down. There was something about her manner that made Richard think of the formal fashion in which one is received in places of mere business, and he began to feel stiff and awkward, and very conscious of his elaborate toilet, and he was not at all made more at his ease by Miss Leverton’s first remark, nor by the very business-like way in which she re-seated herself at her desk, put the tips of her fingers together, and looked at him, he thought, as if he had come to buy shares or give instructions for drawing up a will.

“We were so hurried this morning, Mr. Shrewsbury,” said a very cold and clear-cut voice, “that I could not do more than tell you that you might call here. You asked if you might call to see my mother. I may as well tell you what you might have learnt elsewhere—that my mother is dead, and that I am the sole representative of the Leverton family. But I let you call because I wanted to ask you one or two questions which I couldn’t very well put to you on the steps of Mr. Winch’s office. Besides you have given me a considerable surprise.”

Richard felt as a small boy feels who is suddenly confronted with a stern head-master and talked to in a tone which he does not quite comprehend. He stole a glance at the recumbent figure on the sofa, and saw that Miss Bryce’s large eyes were fixed on a piece of fancy needle-work on which her thin fingers were busily engaged. He had hoped for some gleam of sympathy from her; getting none, he turned to Miss Leverton, and became instantly afraid of that young lady’s blue-grey eyes, which seemed to look him remorselessly through and through. In Mr. Winch’s office he had come to the conclusion that Frances Leverton was the handsomest girl he had ever seen; it hurt him now, in some strange, vague way, that she regarded him, a mild, innocent youth, so very sternly. “I—I’m awfully sorry!” he stammered. “I—really didn’t mean to surprise you.”

“You surprised me very much,” said Frances, with emphasis. “I understood you to say that a letter which you wrote to my father, and which arrived at his office on the morning of his death, was opened and retained by Mr. Carsdale?”

“Ye—es, that’s so,” replied Richard. “You see——”

“Can you tell me what you said in that letter?” demanded Frances. “You can, of course. You said, down there at Mr. Winch’s, that it was more or less of a business letter. Well, Mr. Shrewsbury?”

Richard felt very uncomfortable. He experienced a desire to wriggle; he became conscious that he was very hot and had a tendency to perspire.

“I—you see—I’m sure Carsdale, you know,” he began. “You see, I shouldn’t like Carsdale to be blamed, because Carsdale’s been very good to me, and——”

“Can’t you remember what you said to my father in that letter?” asked Frances, icily. “I think you can.”

Richard pulled himself together, and by a strenuous mental effort succeeded in remembering the grit and pith of what he had written from the Southampton hotel to Barclay Leverton. Frances listened to him without once taking her eyes from his face.

“So you call that a business letter, do you, Mr. Shrewsbury?” she said with a subtle inflection of voice which made Richard wince. “I don’t but that’s perhaps a matter of opinion. As to Mr. John Carsdale’s taste in such matters, the less said the better. But I was in my father’s office at Abbotsbury House that very morning, and Mr. Carsdale should have handed that letter to me. Surely, you yourself see that.”

“I—I understood that Mr. Carsdale was Mr. Leverton’s partner,” said Richard, miserably. “He was, wasn’t he?”

“He was, but not to the extent of sharing his private letters,” answered Frances, coolly. “You meant your letter to be confidential, didn’t you? You were writing to your father’s old friend, weren’t you?”

“Yes,” said Richard. He looked up from the floor with a whipped expression in his eyes. “I expect I’ve made a mess of it,” he said, with a note of contrition that caused Miss Bryce to smile. “Now you’ll go and think all sorts of things about Carsdale, and, as I’ve said, Carsdale’s been awfully good to me.”

“I am not used to thinking about Mr. Carsdale,” said Frances. “I merely wished to know why a letter which was my father’s private affair was retained by him. I suppose I am right in concluding that when you wrote that letter you intended to cultivate the friendship which had previously existed between our families—or parents?”

“Yes, yes, oh, yes!” replied Richard, eagerly. “I was awfully cut up to hear of Mr. Leverton’s death—I was, indeed!”

Frances looked at him with a little frown.

“I don’t remember that you wrote to say so,” she said, rather more frigidly than before.

The girl on the sofa uttered a little deprecatory cough, and Richard who kept eyeing her as hunted animals eye a possible way of escape, saw a spot of colour light up on the pale cheek which was next to him. He himself felt uncomfortably hot. But the plain-tongued young lady entrenched at the desk behind her books and papers looked as cool and as imperturbable as ever.

“No!” said Richard, very humbly. “I didn’t. I—meant to. And then——”

“And then, what with one thing or another, you forgot,” said Frances, interrupting him. “All right, Mr. Shrewsbury, it is no matter. But now that you are here, will you be kind enough to take a message from me to your friend, Mr. John Carsdale?”

“Certainly!” said Richard, with great eagerness. “Of course I will.”

Frances smiled at his impetuousness.

“Then tell Mr. Carsdale,” she said, watching her visitor closely, “that I am quite aware from you of the circumstances under which he opened and retained your letter to my father. Tell him, further, that if I ever catch him dealing with any correspondence that comes to Abbotsbury House in my father’s name, I will make London too hot to hold him! Can you remember all that, Mr. Shrewsbury?”

Richard’s face had flushed to a deeper red—he felt as if the girl had smacked it.

“Yes,” he said quietly. “I can remember all that, and, as I said I would, I’ll carry the message. But—I’m sure Carsdale acted with good intentions.”

“Good intentions to himself,” said Frances. “I gather that you’re a wealthy young man, Mr. Shrewsbury.”

“I have a good deal of money,” answered Richard, modestly.

“Quite so. So that if that letter of yours had been delivered to me, as it ought to have been, I might have had a profitable client,” continued Frances. “Carsdale robbed me of you.”

Richard stared and started. He glanced at the business-like looking desk, and Miss Leverton waved her hand over it.

“I still carry on my father’s concerns,” she said. “I should have been glad to have you for a client. But that’s Carsdale all over—I like you for standing up for him, but you can’t expect me to forgive him for robbing me of possible and profitable business. And I’ll make him smart for it—I can, easily!—if he plays any more tricks on me of that sort.”

Richard began to fidget with his hat and cane.

“I—I didn’t know,” he said lamely. “If I had known——”

“Of course you didn’t know,” interrupted Frances. She turned to her papers, and then held out her hand. “Well, good day,” she said. “I’m obliged to you for clearing up the matter of the letter.”

Richard took the firm, cool hand and dropped it in sheer fright.

“I—I—mayn’t I call again?” he asked desperately.

“Why should you call again?” said Frances, looking up. “Carsdale’s got your business.”

“I wasn’t thinking of business,” said Richard, stoutly.

“Perhaps Mr. Shrewsbury would like to call on Sunday—when you don’t do any business, Frank,” suggested Miss Bryce, with a smile at Richard.

“Yes, oh, yes, thanks!” said Richard, with great eagerness. “Mayn’t I?”

Miss Leverton bent over her letter.

“Well, Sunday afternoon, then,” she murmured.

Then Richard somehow got himself out, and when he had fairly gone, Miss Bryce spoke.

“Frank!” she said. “You treated that poor boy abominably!”

“Bosh!” retorted Miss Leverton. “It will do him good. He won’t get honest, plain speech from Carsdale or from that horrible woman down there at Abbotsbury House!”

“You treated him abominably,” repeated Miss Bryce. “And—he felt it. And why? Because, my dear, the young man is in the way to fall in love with you! I saw it—and I’m never mistaken!”

CHAPTER X
NEWS FOR MRS. WALSINGHAM

By that time it was very seldom that Mrs. Walsingham ever left the office alone; on four days out of the five Richard and his car were waiting for her and the habitués of Abbotsbury House and the Norfolk Street pavement had grown accustomed to seeing her whisked off as if she were some personage of high degree. She and young Mr. Shrewsbury at that time, indeed, were enjoying themselves a good deal in each other’s society. It was very much pleasanter, during those warm summer days, to get into a luxuriously-fitted car and to escape from London to some country town twenty or thirty miles away, there to dine amidst sylvan and shady surroundings, and afterwards to spin back in the cool and purpling twilight, than to be obliged to dress and to dine at fashionable hotels and restaurants, wherein not all the artifice in the world could produce the semblance of what an hour’s journey could give. This daily arrangement had come to be a fixed one—evening after evening Mr. Shrewsbury’s car slid away into one or other of the home counties, and later at night was to be seen outside the flats in which Mrs. Walsingham resided, waiting until its owner had smoked the cigarette to which he was always invited when he had safely brought Mrs. Walsingham home.

But on the afternoon of Richard’s visit to Acacia Mansions, Mrs. Walsingham waited in vain for him—waited, that is to say, for half an hour. There was no settled arrangement between them as to his coming, but it had grown to be such a part of the day’s routine that she had fully expected him, and at five o’clock was in readiness to leave with him. But when, at half-past five, there were no signs of him and no message, Mrs. Walsingham left the office and set out for her favourite restaurant. After what she called a long business day, she liked to dine as near six o’clock as possible, and it was not within her scheme of things that anybody or anything should interfere with her dinner. So she made her way along the Strand towards Leicester Square and Soho: she would dine leisurely, she said to herself, and go home, secure in the knowledge that Richard would present himself at the flat sooner or later in the evening. She was in no wise surprised that he had not come for her at five o’clock; he was engaged, she concluded, with Captain Burgoyne.

The thought of Captain Burgoyne suggested another thought to Mrs. Walsingham, who had just then reached the neighbourhood of Charing Cross. She glanced at her watch, turned and, retracing her steps a little way, entered a jeweller’s shop. It was a quiet high-class establishment, the windows of which were set out with expensive goods, but it was decorated, though unobtrusively, with three gilt balls, and was, in fact, the business place of a fashionable pawnbroker in whose breast many secrets were safely locked.

There was no one in the outer shop when Mrs. Walsingham entered, save the proprietor and some assistants, and at sight of her the proprietor came round the counter and ushered her into a private room at the back of the premises. Mrs. Walsingham dropped into the chair which he politely offered her and unsnapped the patent catch of the bag which she carried.

“I want to pay you the interest on that loan, Mr. Wiertz,” she said. “It’s just about due, isn’t it?”

“Next week, I think,” replied Mr. Wiertz. “You want to renew, again?”

“Yes,” answered Mrs. Walsingham. She produced a purse from her bag and drew out some bank-notes. Mr. Wiertz sat down at a desk and began to write. Suddenly he turned and looked at his visitor with an air of polite meditation.

“I was thinking of writing to you, Mrs. Walsingham,” he said. “It was about those diamonds. Let’s see. I lent you a thousand on them two years ago, didn’t I? Yes—well, they are worth seven or eight times that, you know.”

“Of course, I know,” answered Mrs. Walsingham, regarding him steadily. “But they’re worth more. They’re worth every penny of ten thousand, at the lowest computation, Mr. Wiertz: I had them valued by three different people. Well, and what about them, and why were you going to write to me?”

“I wanted to know if you’d sell them,” answered Mr. Wiertz. “It just so happens that I could do with them. I could make use of them at once. It’s a pity they should lie there in my safe doing nothing. I’ll give you eight thousand for them.”

“No!” answered Mrs. Walsingham, promptly.

“No?” said Mr. Wiertz. “Dear me!—wouldn’t you rather have eight thousand, cash down, than let them lie unseen and go on paying me interest?”

“No, I wouldn’t,” replied Mrs. Walsingham. “They’re quite safe where they are, and there they can stop until I want them. And as I say, they’re worth every penny of ten thousand.”

“I might go to nine thousand,” suggested Mr. Wiertz.

“Not for sale—at any rate, not now,” said Mrs. Walsingham firmly. “I might want them—if I do, I’ll redeem them pretty quick, Mr. Wiertz. If I don’t—well, then, we’ll talk business.”

“I mightn’t have an opening for them then,” remarked Mr. Wiertz. “Just now I have.”

Mrs. Walsingham crackled her bank-notes.

“Diamonds,” she said, “can always make openings for themselves. How much is the interest, Mr. Wiertz?”

Mr. Wiertz fidgeted amongst his papers.

“Supposing I could get you the ten thousand you think they’re worth?” he said. “What do you say to that, Mrs. Walsingham?”

Mrs. Walsingham laughed merrily and shook her head.

“I say that it shows that you believe them to be worth more than ten thousand,” she answered. “No, I’m not going to sell, at present, Mr. Wiertz. Those stones are quite safe in your keeping, and when I want them I’ll find the money to redeem them within an hour. Now, this interest?”

Mr. Wiertz sighed and consulted a book.

“Well you know your own business best,” he observed. “But I wouldn’t pay interest on a loan of a thousand pounds for which I’d lodged security that’s worth, worth——”

“Let’s say ten thousand, Mr. Wiertz,” said Mrs. Walsingham, with another silvery laugh. “I dare say you wouldn’t. But—I will.”

Mr. Wiertz presently let his visitor out by a private door into an alley which communicated with the Strand. And as Mrs. Walsingham tripped out of the alley upon the crowded side-walk, a man who was coming along from the direction of Trafalgar Square caught sight of her, half-paused, looked again, and then slowly turned and followed her. The turning was done in a careless, pointless fashion that would not have attracted attention from any one; for a moment the man paused, to look into a shop-window, as if he had seen something there that aroused curiosity; then he sauntered forward, with Mrs. Walsingham some twenty yards ahead of him. She was wearing a large black feather in her smart hat; the man made a mental note of it in case he should lose her for a moment. But he was a tall, long-limbed fellow, who could take one lounging step to her three quick ones, and it was an easy task to keep his quarry in sight.

Mrs. Walsingham pursued a steady course along King William Street and Green Street into Leicester Square, and eventually plunged into Soho, and disappeared in a certain café, past which the pursuer lazily strolled with inspecting eyes. He sized the place, its possibilities, and its prices up in one all-seeing glance.

“Well, I guess a dollar will just about cover what I’m likely to lay out in that spot,” he mused, as his slow step slackened to a halt. “And anyway, it’s time I ate, so I’ll turn in and see where she’s got to. For that’s her sure!”

Without more ado he pulled down over his eyes the big slouch hat which surrounded his head like an over-sized halo, and, pushing open the swing doors, entered the restaurant. His first glance at the softly-lighted interior showed him Mrs. Walsingham, who, seated at the table which had come to be regarded as hers by right of long custom, was bending over a menu card, and explaining to her usual waiter that she had been away for the last week or two. And thus engaged, she did not notice the stranger, who slipped past and took a seat a little way off, with his face in the shadow. Secure now of not losing her, he sat back and inspected her at his leisure, Mrs. Walsingham remaining all unconscious that she was being so examined.

“That’s her, sure pop!” said the stranger to himself. “That’s all right. And she looks flourishing enough, too.”

Mrs. Walsingham had made considerable progress with her dinner before she became aware of the man’s presence. She was not given to staring about her, having other and more important matters to attend to, and it was only by accident that she happened to look at the particular corner in which her pursuer had placed himself. There had been but few people in that part of the place; now a noisy group of young foreigners, men and women, came in, hungry and hilarious, and a waiter turned up an additional light. It struck full on the stranger’s face, and Mrs. Walsingham, happening to turn at the sudden glare, looked straight at him as he looked straight at her.

For several seconds the two regarded each other steadily; then Mrs. Walsingham looked down at her plate and calmly went on with her dinner. But the man, stealing a glance at her now and then, knew that she had recognized him; he knew also that she knew that he had recognized her. He waited and watched for a sign. And Mrs. Walsingham gave none. Nor did she show any sign of perturbation, or of alarm, or confusion; she continued to eat and drink as quietly as if nothing had happened, and if her eyes happened to turn in the stranger’s direction, they remained as expressionless as if they rested on a statue.

But the watcher knew very well that Mrs. Walsingham was contemplating something, and that that something related to him, and he continued to watch without seeming to do so. And at last, while she was trifling with her coffee and her crème de menthe, he saw her take from her bag a tiny memorandum tablet, on a leaf of which she scribbled a line or two. Then she folded the torn-out leaf into a neat roll, and with a calm stare at the stranger across the room, laid it on the outer edge of the table at which she was sitting. The stranger’s left eyelid flickered imperceptibly. A few moments later he nodded to his waiter, paid his bill, and slowly lounged out. Mrs. Walsingham was engaged in studying the pages of a continental journal as he passed her table—when she looked up again the rolled-up scrap of paper had disappeared. And presently, she, too, paid for her entertainment, and walked out with her usual languid grace.

The stranger walked with swifter steps when he was once clear of the restaurant. He made for the corner of the street, and there unrolled the note and read what Mrs. Walsingham had written.

“Go into Soho Square, and wait for me at the corner of Greek Street.”

The stranger smiled and tore the bit of paper into fragments as he strode off.

“I knew she’d be curious,” he muttered. “Well, that was a lucky chance.”

There was no verbal greeting between them when she presently joined him. He lifted his hat, and she gave him a sharp nod, and they instinctively turned towards a quiet corner of the square.

“That was sheer luck,” he said. “I was looking for you. I’d looked three days.”

“And why?” she asked.

“Because I’ve got something to tell you,” he answered. “Maybe you know it. Maybe you don’t. You see, I’ve come straight from there. Well, it’s just this, whether you know it or not. He’s—dead.”

He thought she was going to fall, for she turned white to the lips, and he put out his hand to clutch her. But then he saw her set her lips, and in a second the colour came back, and she turned on him with glittering eyes.

“Prove to me that that’s true—true!” she said in a low, intense voice. “And I’ll—I’ll——”

“What?” he said.

“I’ll make it worth your while,” she answered. “I will!”

The man scratched his chin.

“It’s true enough,” he answered, with a short laugh. “He was shot dead in a scrap at Carville—that’s in Nevada—six weeks ago. I was there—I saw it. Prove it? Well, I suppose you’d take a letter or a cable from, say, the sheriff, as proof! He was going under his own name. It’s quite true. Of course, I didn’t know where you were, and there was no one else to let you know.”

“Give me that sheriff’s name,” she said. “Here—write it down—the address, too.”

The man scribbled a line or two in the notebook she held out to him. She glanced at it and thrust it into her bag.

“Meet me here at this time to-morrow,” she said. “And—here, I dare say you’ll find that useful.”

She pushed a bank-note into his hand, and without staying to hear more, turned away and hurried in the direction of Oxford Street and to the nearest post-office. When she came out, ten minutes later, she hailed a taxi-cab and bade the driver go to her flat. At her own door her maid met her and gave her a meaning look.

“Mr. Shrewsbury’s in the drawing-room,” she said. “He’s just come.”

CHAPTER XI
UNFORESEEN

Mrs. Walsingham made straight for the door of the drawing-room. But before she reached it she paused and looked at her maid. The two women regarded each other steadily. Then the maid smiled faintly.

“You look—tired,” she said.

Mrs. Walsingham nodded and turned towards her bedroom.

“Tell Mr. Shrewsbury I’ll be with him presently,” she said. “Take the whiskey and soda in. Stop—I’ll have some myself. I am tired.”

She walked into the dining-room, and mixing herself a drink as she stood at the sideboard, carried it off to her bedroom. Once in there, she went over to the mirror and looked at herself. She knew well enough what Guyner meant when she spoke significantly of her looking tired—there were lines under her eyes, and a pinched expression about her mouth, and between her fine eyebrows there were two distinct creases. She looked ten years older than she had looked when she tripped out of Abbotsbury House only two hours before. She frowned as she contemplated herself in her glass, but the frown suddenly changed to a smile.

“All the same,” she murmured, with a note of triumph in her voice, “if that’s true, I’m free. Free! My God—and with what possibilities!”

There was nothing tired or discomposed about Mrs. Walsingham, however, when she joined Richard half an hour later. All traces of fatigue had gone from eyes and mouth and forehead; she was wearing her prettiest gown; she gave her visitor her brightest smile. And Richard, who was still feeling somewhat sore after his experience of the afternoon, suddenly felt a sense of relief and of pleasure, and realized that Mrs. Walsingham’s cheerful company was a valuable asset in his life, and he held her hand rather longer than was necessary when she gave it to him.

“I thought you were lost,” she said, laughing. “Don’t forget that you’re only a stranger in London yet.”

“I’m awfully sorry I didn’t turn up,” he said. “I went to lunch with Burgoyne, and then—then I went to make a call at Maida Vale, and after that I found I was near Lord’s, and so I turned in there for an hour, and there was some rather exciting play, and so I stopped longer than I meant to, and then I knew you’d have gone, and so—well, I waited until later.”

“I hope you’ve dined,” she said.

“A bit hurriedly,” he answered. “And you?”

“I don’t let anything interfere with my dinner,” she said. “I didn’t wait very long for you. Give me a cigarette. And what,” she continued, settling herself in her favourite chair, “what took you to Maida Vale? I didn’t know you had ever heard of such a place.”

“I don’t think I ever had,” Richard replied. “I went there to call on Miss Leverton.”

Mrs. Walsingham suddenly dropped her cigarette and made some fuss about picking it up. By the time she had recovered it and had settled herself again she was quite composed and carelessly indifferent.

“Oh—and I didn’t know that you knew Miss Leverton,” she said.

“I didn’t until to-day—I didn’t even know there was a Miss Leverton. No one ever told me there was,” said Richard.

“That means that neither Mr. Carsdale nor I ever told you,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “Why should we?”

“Oh, I don’t know—except that her father and mine were old friends,” he answered, doubtfully. “I—of course, I don’t know anything—I mean of what’s done, or isn’t done.”

“What’s chiefly done is never to meddle with things that don’t concern one,” observed Mrs. Walsingham sententiously. “And where did you meet Miss Frances Leverton?”

“I met her at the solicitor’s—Winch’s, in Lincoln’s Inn—where I went with Burgoyne. And I asked her if I might call on her mother—of course, I thought she’d have a mother—to offer my condolence on her father’s death, and she said I might, and so I went this afternoon.”

“Is that why you are so elaborately attired?” asked Mrs. Walsingham, eyeing her visitor’s garments.

“I—I thought you’d got to tog yourself up rather to pay calls,” said Richard. “Isn’t that—proper?”

“Quite. Well, so you called on Miss Leverton’s mother?” said Mrs. Walsingham. “Proceed.”

“There wasn’t any mother—she’s dead, it seems. And,” continued Richard with boyish candour, “I want to ask you something—Miss Leverton seemed to be angry because—well, because of that letter which I wrote to her father—the one that Carsdale got, you know.”

Mrs. Walsingham dropped her cigarette into an ash-tray and selected another from the cabinet at her side.

“Frances Leverton is the sort of young woman who would be angry at anything that didn’t suit her,” she said. “She is an only child, and she was spoilt by her father, who let her have too much of her own way. She used to bully him at the office, and while he was ill she used to interfere in affairs that didn’t concern her. Of course, she’d be angry about the letter, but it was as much Carsdale’s concern as hers. Didn’t you want Leverton to advise you financially? Well, hasn’t Carsdale done it instead—only much better? She’s mad because your business got into his hands—she thinks she’s a financial genius. That’s all, my friend—pure pique.”

“Oh!” said Richard, blankly. “I see. But—she gave me a message for Carsdale.” He repeated it word for word, having learnt it by heart. “I don’t like giving it,” he said.

“Fiddle!” said Mrs. Walsingham. “Give it, and hear Carsdale laugh at it. Do you think he’ll attach any importance to a message like that. You don’t know John Carsdale if you do.”

“I didn’t want to hurt his feelings,” said Richard.

“Don’t alarm yourself,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “Well, and so now, I suppose, you’ll be visiting Maida Vale again?”

Richard felt himself blushing—why, he did not know.

“Miss Leverton said I might call on Sunday,” he answered.

Mrs. Walsingham laughed.

“Really!” she said. “So Miss Frances is human after all. But, of course, she’s got Lizzie Bryce there to play propriety.”

“Lizzie Bryce?” repeated Richard, vaguely. “Oh—is that the invalid lady?”

“She’s not an invalid—she’s a cripple for life,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “She’s a protégée of Barclay Leverton’s, and a very clever young woman. They’re both clever women, those two. Mind they don’t eat you.”

Richard looked at her doubtfully.

“I never know when you’re serious and when you’re not,” he said. “I don’t think you like Miss Leverton.”

“I don’t suppose it matters the value of a farthing whether I do or I don’t,” replied Mrs. Walsingham. “Frankly, I don’t, because she doesn’t like me. Now, her father and I were very good friends. He was a good sort, Barclay Leverton—perhaps rather too easy-going, but, I say, a good sort. His daughter cherishes what they call Advanced Ideas. She believes in women’s rights, and she’s clever—she’s a New Woman. I’m an Old Woman. I don’t know what women’s rights are and I’m not clever.”

“That isn’t true,” said Richard, with candid emphasis. “I think you’re the cleverest woman I ever met.”

“You’ve met such a lot, haven’t you?” retorted Mrs. Walsingham, teasingly. She threw her cigarette away, and coming over to one of the windows, looked out on the London twilight. “Well,” she said presently, in a low voice, “perhaps you’ll get Miss Leverton and Lizzie Bryce to look after you. I’m thinking of going away.”

Richard looked up in genuine alarm. He suddenly realized that this woman filled a very large place in his small world; he suddenly remembered that since his arrival in London he had spent most of his time with her, that he had always found her amusing, interesting, enlivening; when he had just said that she was the cleverest woman he had ever met, he sincerely meant it, for she had always been ready and willing to give him advice on all sorts of matters, and her advice he had invariably proved to be good. Going away!—that would indeed leave a blank in his scheme of things which it would be hard to fill.

“Going away!” he exclaimed. “Why—where are you going?”

“I don’t know,” she said, indifferently. “Timbuctoo—the North Pole—the South Pole—anywhere. I’m—tired.”

“Tired?” he said. “Of—London?”

“Of London and Life,” she answered. “Why shouldn’t I be? You’re young, my friend, and all young people are dense.”

“Oh, come now,” he said, interrupting her, “I’m no younger than you are, you know! You told me yourself the other day that, as a matter of fact, I’m older than you—you said you wouldn’t be twenty-one until September, and now it’s only June. I was twenty-one three months ago.”

“A woman is always at least five years older than a man,” she answered. “I’m quite an old woman compared to you—you’re a mere child. And as I was saying, all young people are dense—they don’t, won’t, can’t see!”

“What can’t I see?” asked Richard.

“That I’m a little wearied of things,” she answered, still staring straight before her into the twilight. “What do I do, after all? I went in for business because I didn’t want to be idle, but I’m not particularly interested in going down to Abbotsbury House and sitting there for so many hours a day. No—I shall go.”

“Where?” asked Richard, in tones that showed his concern. “Where?”

“Perhaps I’ll go to America—to New York. Perhaps I’ll go to Australia,” she answered. “Perhaps I won’t. Perhaps I’ll go travelling and write a book about it when I come back.”

“I don’t know why you want to go anywhere,” he said doggedly.

“Perhaps. But you don’t understand,” she said. “I suppose the real reason is that I’m—lonely.”

“Lonely!” exclaimed Richard. He got up from his chair, and went over to the window, and looked closely at her. “You don’t mean that?” he asked in a voice that trembled a little.

“Oh, you’ve been very good,” she said. “I—I haven’t been lonely since you came. But—I was before, and I shall be again.”

“Again?” he said. “Again?”

Mrs. Walsingham lifted her eyes to his, gave him one look, and dropped them.

“I can’t expect to monopolize you always,” she said, in a very low voice. “No—I really think I shall go away.”

Richard unconsciously moved nearer to her. In that half-light she looked prettier than ever; all the grace and charm of her femininity suddenly appealed to him with overwhelming force; his blood suddenly seemed to catch fire and his pulses leapt.

“Don’t!” he said, hoarsely. “Don’t go! I—I don’t want you to go. I—I shan’t let you go!”

And letting all his natural instincts suddenly assert themselves, he threw his arms round her and drew her to him.

“Stay!” he whispered. “Stay—and marry me! If you won’t—if you do go, you know I shall follow you.”

She made a fluttering movement to escape from him, but the pressure of his arms tightened. He laughed a little—grown confident, although mightily surprised, in his own boldness.

“There, you see, you can’t go,” he said. “I’m stronger than you—in more than one way. You shan’t go until you promise to stop. Promise!”

Mrs. Walsingham suddenly grew afraid—she found her own pulses stirred, her own heart beating; something in her became responsive. She tried to move, and could not; she tried to speak, and could not. And the boy whom she thought a mere youngster, laughed confidently again.

“Promise!” he repeated. “Promise you’ll stop—and that you’ll marry me. Promise—Sylvie!”

He forced her face up to his until their eyes met. Hers dropped swiftly.

“Yes!” she murmured.

A moment later she broke away, to gaze at him with genuine amazement.

“Is it—real?” she asked.

Richard took her into his arms again with a laugh of triumph.

“Of course it’s real!” he said. “Do you think I was going to let you go? You won’t go now.”

She shook her head and again looked at him in silence. For perhaps the first time in her life, Mrs. Walsingham was genuinely surprised. And when Richard had gone, she sat for a long time, thinking, thinking....

And just as midnight sounded from a neighbouring clock, came the cablegram from Nevada, and she tore it open with trembling fingers. Then she knew that the news she had heard in Soho Square was true.

CHAPTER XII
MR. CARSDALE’S CHAMBERS

Mrs. Walsingham read her cablegram three times over; then she turned to her maid, whom she had bidden to wait, and who stood a little way off, watching her mistress with speculative eyes.

“Sophie,” she said quietly, “ring up the Electherium Club, and ask if Mr. Carsdale is in the house. If he is, tell them to ask him to come to the telephone.”

She sat waiting, folding and refolding the sheet of flimsy paper, until the maid came back.

“Mr. Carsdale’s waiting,” she announced briefly.

“Then get ready to go out with me,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “As soon as you’re ready run down and tell the porter to call a taxi. I’ll be with you in a few minutes.”

The maid disappeared, and her mistress went into the small lobby in which the telephone was installed.

“Is that you?” she asked.

“This is me,” answered Mr. Carsdale, carelessly. “It is near bedtime.”

“I want to see you—I must see you to-night.”

“You mean this morning. Very well—shall I come round?”

“No—I’ll come to you. I’m coming now. Will you go straight home?”

“If it is really important. Is it?”

“It is. Go home at once.”

“All right,” said Mr. Carsdale. “Twenty minutes, then.”

Mrs. Walsingham hung up the receiver and passed into her bedroom. She fastened a mantilla-like veil about her head, got herself into a cloak that covered her smart gown, and, still holding the cablegram tightly in her hand, went downstairs. A taxi-cab stood at the door of the flats, and Sophie Guyner, hatted and cloaked, waited by it.

“I’ve told the man where to go,” she said.

Mrs. Walsingham made no remark. She got into the cab, and the maid followed her. The mistress preserved silence all the way to Jermyn Street, where Mr. Carsdale kept his bachelor state; the maid amused herself by looking out on the still busy streets. And as they pulled up near the back of St. James’s Church, another taxi-cab came from the opposite direction and stopped to allow Carsdale to alight from it. The three met on the pavement.

“Hullo!” said Carsdale. “We arrive together. Come along.”

He led the way into an adjacent house and up the stairs into his rooms. In what was obviously his dining and breakfast-room, he pointed the maid to an easy chair and to the evening newspapers which lay on a table at its side, and going to the sideboard, he poured out a glass of wine, and picked up a biscuit-box.

“There, Sophie, you can amuse yourself with a drink and a biscuit, while your mistress and I talk business,” he said good-humouredly. “Come this way, Mrs. Walsingham.”

He opened a door and led his visitor through one room into another—a small apartment evidently used as an office—and turned up the electric light.

“May as well have as much space as possible between ourselves and Sophie’s sharp ears,” he said. “Now, what is it, Sylvie? Something, of course, of the deepest dye, at this hour of the night. Hullo!—you look a bit white and upset. Have a whiskey-and-soda?”

“No!” she said. “Sit down, Jack. There’s a lot to say. I wanted to tell you to-night. Besides, I know you never go to bed before two. Listen—I went to Bigiano’s this evening to dinner—alone.”

“Well?” said Mr. Carsdale.

“And whom do you think I suddenly caught sight of?”

“Heaven knows!”

“Sandy Kinahan.”

Mr. Carsdale’s eyebrows arched themselves almost to the roots of his hair, and his mouth opened.

“Good Lord!” he exclaimed. “Back again!”

“Yes. He was dining at a table nearly opposite mine,” continued Mrs. Walsingham. “Now I come to think of it, I expect he’d seen me and followed me. I recognized him at once, but I didn’t show any sign of it, and he didn’t show anything, either. Then I pencilled a line telling him to meet me in Soho Square, and he picked it off my table as he passed. And when we met, he told me straight out that—that—that he’s dead!”

“He! Dead?” exclaimed Carsdale. “Dead?”

“Dead! Shot in a fight, a brawl, at a place called Carville, in Nevada.”

Carsdale stood staring at her for a full minute. Then he smote his hands together. “God, Sylvie!—if it’s only true!” he said.

Mrs. Walsingham unclosed her right hand. In the palm, tightly compressed, lay the cablegram. She began to unfold it.

“That’s what I said to—to Sandy. He told me to cable to the sheriff. I did, there and then, and prepaid a reply. Here it is—it came just before I telephoned to you at the Electherium.”

Carsdale took the much-creased paper and read the message twice over. He nodded his head several times.

“That seems right—that seems right—that seems all right!” he said. “Lord, what a blessing—what a blessing, Sylvie! But remember,” he suddenly added, “remember, you must have it verified—verified beyond all possible doubt. Because——”

“Yes?” she said. “Yes, Jack?”

“You’ll marry again,” he concluded. “You’re sure to marry again.”

Mrs. Walsingham looked at the door and lowered her voice, in spite of the fact that there was no possibility of any other person overhearing what she said.

“That’s another matter I wanted to speak to you about at once,” she said. “Jack—the boy’s asked me to marry him.”

Carsdale’s eyebrows again arched themselves.

“Good Lord!” he exclaimed. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” she answered.

“When?”

“To-night,” she said. “I—I hadn’t the least notion that he would. But—he did.”

“Well?” said Carsdale. “And—you?”

“I said I—would. He—he made me say I would,” she answered. “I—I never thought he could be so—well, masterful.”

“It strikes me that young Master Hopeful is finding his feet,” observed Carsdale. He dropped into a chair and surveyed his companion carefully and speculatively. “Well, I don’t know why you shouldn’t marry him, Sylvie,” he said presently; “you’re a clever woman, and you can, if you like, be a very decent woman, and play a straight game, and all that——”

“I will—if I marry him,” she said, a little indignantly.

“That’s all right—I said you could, and that’s as good as saying you would,” said Carsdale. “Um! Well, but this is a serious affair. There’ll be this Walsingham myth to settle up and explain—that can be done, yes, it can be done satisfactorily, I think, quite satisfactorily—but, I’ll tell you what, there’s always the danger of—Kinahan.”

Mrs. Walsingham regarded him anxiously.

“You think he might be dangerous?” she said.

“I think Sandy Kinahan is a man who might be inclined to indulge in blackmailing tactics,” replied Carsdale. “I must think. Now, where is Kinahan to be got hold of?”

“I’m to meet him in Soho Square to-morrow—no, this evening,” said Mrs. Walsingham.

“Well, I must have a talk to him. There’s one blessing about it,” he continued, “I’ve got a bit of a hold on that gentleman—not much, but sufficient. You must induce him to see me—tell him I’m going to do him good. Can you manage that?”

“Leave that to me,” she answered.

“Then you’d better bring him here,” said Carsdale. “I don’t want him going to Norfolk Street. Bring him here this evening—I’ll be in from eight until ten.”

“I’ll bring him here at half-past eight,” she said. “I can manage him. From what I saw, I should say he’s looking out for somebody to do good to him. Now I’ll go.”

She rose and moved towards the door, but seeing that Carsdale was in deep thought, she paused, and stood, waiting. He, too, presently rose, and looked at her as if he was trying to recollect something.

“Yes?” she said. “What is it?”

“I was trying to—recall a few things,” he answered. “Let’s see—Kinahan was the only man—beside myself—who ever knew, wasn’t he?”

“Yes,” she replied. “No one else ever knew anything.”

“Then there’s only Kinahan to settle with,” he said. “That makes it easier. To-morrow night, then. I think the two of us will be able to square him satisfactorily. Come along. I’ll see you safely to your cab.”

In the outer room, Sophie Guyner had dropped asleep. Carsdale, as he entered, looked at her keenly, wondering if she was really dozing or only pretending to doze. He silently indicated her to her mistress; Mrs. Walsingham nodded reassuringly, seeing what was in his mind.

“She’s had a long day,” she said. “Sophie!”

But at that moment a loud knock at the outer door roused the sleeping woman and made Carsdale and Mrs. Walsingham start.

“Now, who’s this?” growled Carsdale. “Some night-bird or other, I suppose, who thinks I’ll give him a drink. Stay there a moment.”

He went out into his lobby, drawing the door of the room after him without shutting. Opening this outer door, he found himself confronted by a policeman in uniform, who drew back on seeing him.

“Yes?” said Carsdale.

“Beg pardon, sir—are these Mr. Carsdale’s rooms?” he said.

Carsdale nodded curtly.

“What is it?” he asked.

“You’re Mr. Carsdale, sir? I’ve come on from Charing Cross Hospital. There’s a man been taken in who’s had a bad accident—motor-bus. They say there’s no chance for him—in fact,” added the policeman, “I was to say he was dying fast. He asked for you—had this address in a pocket-book. And I was to ask you, if you could, to bring a lady name Sylvia, or Sylvie, or some such——”

Carsdale stopped him.

“Come in,” he said. He led the way into the room, where Sophie, now wide awake, was staring at Mrs. Walsingham. And Mrs. Walsingham nodded at Carsdale as he and the policeman entered.

“I heard,” she said. She turned to the policeman. “What is he like—this man?”

“A tall, loose-built man, looks and speaks like an American, but with a bit of Irish accent in him,” answered the policeman. He turned to Carsdale. “You’d best come quick, sir—the doctors said he couldn’t last long. He said you were to get the lady if she was handy—if not, to come yourself. There was something he had to tell.”

“This is the lady,” said Carsdale. “Come along at once.”

“I’ve a taxi-cab outside,” said the policeman.

Carsdale motioned them all outside the room, turned down the light, and followed them. They got half way to the hospital before he spoke. Then he turned to the officer.

“How was it?” he asked. “Do you know?”

“Picked him up,” answered the policeman, laconically. “Stepped straight off the curb into a motor-bus coming down the Haymarket.”

Carsdale nodded and bent over to Mrs. Walsingham.

“It’s Kinahan, of course,” he said. “And I’m wondering what he has to say.”

At the hospital somebody put the two women into a reception-room, and bidding them wait, took Carsdale outside.

“You’re too late,” said an official, coming forward. “The man’s dead. He died soon after the officer went off to you. Is he a relation of yours or of any friend of yours?”

“No,” answered Carsdale, “but I can identify him.”

“This way, then,” said the official.

Ten minutes later Carsdale came back to the waiting-room and took Mrs. Walsingham aside into a quiet corner.

“It was Kinahan,” he whispered. “He’s dead—I’ve seen him. He said nothing here—not a word. And now there isn’t a man living, Sylvie, who knows the secret but me, and you’re—safe!”

CHAPTER XIII
THE BOND STREET JEWELLER

Richard Shrewsbury awoke next morning to suddenly remember two things—the first, that Captain Burgoyne was coming to breakfast; the second that he was engaged to be married.

Now that the first excitement was over, he found himself not a little puzzled as to how the affairs of the previous evening had come about. He was well aware that he had come to be very fond of Sylvie Walsingham’s society, that she was the most important factor in his small world, that she had become, in a sense, necessary to him, that he liked and admired her, and was always well content when he was with her, that she always amused and interested him, and that she was just the sort of smart and pretty woman that he liked to be seen about with. And he was also very well aware that when he went to her that evening the idea of marrying her had never so much as entered his head. He felt equally sure, being as yet very innocent and unlearned in the ways of the world, that it had never entered hers.

“I persuaded her,” he said to himself as he began to dress. “I expect it was one of those things that are bound to be. And after all——”

He turned to a new photograph of Mrs. Walsingham, which he had put up on the mantelpiece of his bedroom only the day before, and Kedgin having gone out of the room, he took it down and looked carefully at it. Yes, there was no doubt that he would have one of the prettiest wives in London, and she would do credit to him, and to all the finery and luxury that he could give her, and he was very, very fond of her, and they had always got on like a house on fire, and ... and then he put the photograph back in its place and wondered vaguely why he had been very much attracted to Frances Leverton, and why there was something about her that had made him feel very down in the mouth when she dismissed him so curtly and very cock-a-whoop when, through the lame girl’s intercession, he had obtained permission to call at Acacia Mansions again.

Now, he thought, that engagement would perhaps not be quite so important as it had seemed—he would have to devote himself to his fiancée more than ever; perhaps—he was well aware that there was no love lost between Mrs. Walsingham and Miss Leverton—perhaps she would not allow him to go to Acacia Mansions. At the notion of that he laughed, a little cynically, and proceeded to complete his toilet.

Burgoyne came punctually to the moment of his appointment, alert, hungry, and bustling, and gave his surroundings an all-embracing and comprehensive stare.

“You seem to have lodged yourself in magnificence, young gentleman,” he said, gazing at the pictures, the books, and the old china. “Who inducted you into all this grandeur?”

“Carsdale—the man you saw yesterday,” replied Richard. “Carsdale is an awfully useful man to know.”

“Evidently,” said Burgoyne, still looking round. “But you didn’t find all these things—the books and pictures and ornaments—here?”

“No, they’re mine—I bought ’em,” answered Richard, gazing at his possessions with the pride of a child who owns valuable toys which it does not quite understand.

“I congratulate you on your taste. And pray, who helped you to form it. Somebody who knows something about these things, I think,” said Burgoyne. “I don’t believe you brought an epicurean taste in bindings, a nice discernment in pictures, or an even superficial knowledge of old china from Trinidad, young man.”

“No,” answered Richard, frankly. “I didn’t. I don’t know much about any of those things. Mrs. Walsingham helped me in that direction.”

“Oh, Mrs. Walsingham, the lady I saw at Carsdale’s, eh?” said Burgoyne. “Then I congratulate her on her taste—I possess a little, a very little, myself—just enough, Master Richard, to know when I encounter people who have more. I think your friend, Mrs. Walsingham, must be very clever.”

Richard glanced at the door of the room in which they were standing. In the next room Kedgin was moving about the breakfast table. Richard watched him until he disappeared to other regions.

“Oh, ah, yes!” he said shortly. “Yes—I believe so. The—er—fact is, Burgoyne, I wanted to tell you—you’re the first to know, really—the fact is, Mrs. Walsingham and I are—er—engaged to be married.”

Burgoyne, who had screwed an eye-glass into his right eye in order to examine a pair of exquisite water-colour sketches, turned and let it drop.

“Oh!” he said. “You and Mrs. Walsingham are engaged to be married, eh, Dick? Ah! Really! Now do you know, when those sort of announcements are made to me, I never know how to reply to them? One is supposed to shower congratulations on the persons who make them—and that sort of thing. I never do. You see, I don’t know Mrs. Walsingham. I saw yesterday a very pretty and smartly-gowned lady—but I don’t know any more. The great thing, dear boy, is—are you satisfied?”

“Quite!” answered Richard, emphatically. “Quite!”

Burgoyne slapped his young friend’s shoulder and shook hands with him.

“Then that’s all right, and I’ll be your best man,” he said. “That is, if you’ll have me. And here’s the welcome news of breakfast.”

Over the breakfast table, the elder man occasionally stole a keen look at the youngster, as if he were endeavouring to penetrate through the air and atmosphere of cheery good-humour which hung all over Richard. He was wondering what had happened since the previous day to bring this engagement about; that it had not been then made he was quite certain, knowing well that Richard was not the sort of young man to keep secrets from his friends. But he observed that his host’s appetite was not only unimpaired, but healthy and vigorous, and from that fact he concluded that Richard’s mind was quite easy on all matters of whatever nature, and he accordingly dismissed his friend’s affairs from him, and began to think of his own.

“And so Carsdale’s a smart business man, Dick?” he asked when they had settled down to breakfast and Kedgin had taken himself away. “A really clever man at his work, eh?”

“Carsdale’s one of the cleverest men in London,” answered Richard, with deep assurance.

“Is that his general reputation, or do you speak of your own opinion?” asked Burgoyne.

“I can only tell what I know,” answered Richard. And he entered into a plain account of what Carsdale had done for him in the way of investing the major portion of his fortune, not forgetting to repeat the encomiums passed upon the transaction by the highly respectable bankers. But in detailing the magnitude and the soundness of this transaction, he forgot to mention that he had given Carsdale ten thousand pounds to play with, and Burgoyne was consequently impressed.

“Well, that seems highly satisfactory,” said Burgoyne. “Carsdale may be of use to me. I want some man of his sort as a sort of medium. I meant, of course, to go to Leverton.”

For a moment Richard’s thoughts turned to Frances Leverton. Here was a chance of introducing business to her. Carsdale, whether by intention or not, had taken away his, Richard’s, business from her; it would be doing her a good turn to get Burgoyne to give her a chance.

“Miss Leverton is carrying on some part of her father’s business,” he said. “I don’t quite know what she does, but I think she advises people about investments, and——”

“No!” said Burgoyne. “I wouldn’t employ a woman in business matters under any consideration. But I think Carsdale might do for what I want.”

“What do you want?” asked Richard.

“To form a company for developing the district which I’ve been exploring,” replied Burgoyne. “There’s an enormous trade to be done in that corner of the world. Oh, I’m going to do it, of course! I shall put a good deal of money into it myself, now that I’ve come into this rather unexpected wealth. You’d better come in with me, Dick. In two years any company formed on lines I propose, and with the capital I’m thinking of, will be getting twenty, aye, thirty per cent. on its money. There’s a veritable virgin gold mine there.”

“Oh, I’ll come in,” said Richard. “That is, of course, if Carsdale approves. I’ve left everything in his hands, you see.”

Burgoyne smiled.

“I think Carsdale will see the possibilities when I talk to him,” he said. “I must make an appointment. For a few days I’m about filled up.”

“Can you give me half an hour this morning?” asked Richard, a little shyly and diffidently. “Do, if you can, Burgoyne.”

The explorer pulled out his watch.

“I’m due at the Royal Geographical Society’s place at half-past eleven,” he said. “And it’s now half-past ten. What is it, Dick?”

Richard laughed and looked somewhat shame-faced.

“I—well, I suppose I’ve got to buy an engagement ring,” he said. “I thought perhaps you’d go with me to Levanter’s place in Bond Street.”

“That’s on my way,” answered Burgoyne. “Levanter’s, eh? That’s a very swell establishment, isn’t it? Perhaps they could do something for me. I want to have my necklace valued—the expensive luxury which I redeemed yesterday, you know. I really don’t know what it’s worth, and I believe I shall sell it.”

“Sell it to me!” said Richard, eagerly. “I’ll buy it.”

Burgoyne gave the young gentleman a queer look. He was not precisely aware of the full amount of Richard’s fortune, and it seemed to him that the buying of diamond necklaces was not a thing to be lightly entered upon.

“What would you do with it?” he asked, smiling.

“Why give it to Sylvie, of course,” answered Richard.

“A pretty name,” commented Burgoyne, and secretly wondered who Mrs. Walsingham had been. “Well, we’ll see, Dick. Of course, if you want to buy diamonds——”

“All women love diamonds,” interjected Richard, with an air of wisdom.

“True, my son,” said Burgoyne, gravely. “They do. And,” he added to himself, “they love young men who can afford to give them diamonds. Well,” he said aloud, “suppose we go round, then?”

“But—your necklace?” said Richard.

Burgoyne laughed, and tapped the breast of his buttoned-up coat.

“I have it—here,” he answered. “Here, in a wash-leather bag. The fact is, I’ve never had it off me since I took possession of it again, yesterday. I—slept with it under my pillow. I’m not sure that I didn’t dream of it.”

Closeted with the Bond Street jeweller, who already knew him very well as a good customer whose purchases so far had been chiefly for himself in the way of sleeve-links, scarf-pins, and such-like adjuncts to a rich young man’s personal adornments, Richard proved hard to please.

He asked Burgoyne’s advice, he asked Mr. Levanter’s advice; he endeavoured to combine their ideas and their taste with his own. Finally he decided on a plain ring in which were set five stones of the purest quality. The price made Burgoyne jump, but Richard drew out his cheque-book, and paid the sum demanded without comment. He put the ring in his pocket, and rose with a sigh of relief.

“Now it’s your turn,” he said, looking at Burgoyne.

“And you’ve been so long at making up your mind that you’ve left me no time,” said Burgoyne. He drew out his wash-leather bag from an inner pocket of his vest, and handed it to the jeweller. “I want you to do something for me, Mr. Levanter,” he said. “In this bag, which, as you see, is sealed, you will find a diamond necklace which has been in my family for about a hundred years and is now my property. I’ve never had it properly valued, and I want to know what it is really worth. Look it over this morning. I can’t stay now, but I’ll come in before lunch.”

Then he got Richard out, bidding him carry his newly-acquired bauble to his fiancée, and he himself hurried away to his appointment. He was kept by it longer than he had anticipated; then a fellow-explorer carried him off to lunch at the Bristol; it was not until the middle of the afternoon that he remembered the jeweller and the task he had entrusted to him. He went off to Bond Street, and entered the shop with a careless smile.

“Well, Mr. Levanter?” he said.

Mr. Levanter led him into the room in which Richard had inspected the rings, and unlocked a safe. He took out the wash-leather case and looked at Captain Burgoyne with a curious expression.

“You meant me to value these as—as diamonds?” he said.

“As diamonds? Why, of course!” answered Burgoyne. “Of course! Diamonds!”

“Well, Captain,” said Mr. Levanter, drawing out the necklace, “I thought so. But these, sir, are not diamonds. These things are paste!”

CHAPTER XIV
BURGOYNE STARTS A NEW TRAIL

On hearing the jeweller make this remarkable pronouncement, Burgoyne, who had been glancing around the room in a careless fashion, suddenly became very serious, and sitting down on a chair which happened to be placed immediately behind him, crossed his hands on the crook of his umbrella, and stared hard at the man who confronted him from the other side of the table.

“I—perhaps I didn’t quite catch what you said, Mr. Levanter,” he remarked. “I am a little absent-minded, and sometimes think about one thing when I ought to be attending to another.”

Mr. Levanter cleared his throat and laid a finger on the diamond necklace.

“I said, Captain Burgoyne, that these are not diamonds,” he repeated. “They are paste.”

Burgoyne nodded.

“Paste, eh?” he said. “Paste! You are—certain?”

The jeweller shrugged his shoulders and smiled. And Burgoyne suddenly remembered Mr. Levanter’s reputation.

“Of course, of course!” he made haste to say. “Of course you will know. Dear me! But this is very extraordinary, Mr. Levanter—it is exceedingly extraordinary.”

Mr. Levanter looked a polite inquiry.

“You were quite under the impression that these were—genuine stones?” he suggested.

Burgoyne indulged himself in a second of sardonic laughter.

“I will tell you a little story, Mr. Levanter,” he said. “That necklace—which is believed, on the best evidence, to have belonged to the Empress Maria Louisa—has been in possession of my family for a good hundred years. I can testify that ever since I was a small boy it had never been out of the hands of my father or myself until three years ago, when I lost sight of it under circumstances which I will tell you of. But first let me tell you that, not long before his death, my father had that necklace valued—it was then said to be worth about ten thousand pounds.”

Mr. Levanter tapped the necklace again.

“If these had been real stones,” he said, “I should have valued this necklace at between eleven and twelve thousand pounds.”

“Very good,” said Burgoyne. “Well, now, Mr. Levanter, I am perfectly certain, absolutely certain, that what I had put into my hands by my father on his death-bed was the necklace which had been valued at about ten thousand. And it never went out of my personal possession until, three years ago, I deposited it with an acquaintance as security for a loan of five thousand pounds. That acquaintance is now dead, but he took great pains to ensure that I should recover my necklace. And yesterday I paid his executors the amount of the loan and the accrued interest, and the necklace was then fetched from the bank in which it had been deposited. As I thought of selling it, I brought it to you for valuation. And—you tell me it is paste. No—what you really tell me, Mr. Levanter, is that that is not my necklace at all, but is—what? Surely, something that has been substituted for it!”

The jeweller shook his head and, picking up the object which lay between them, looked at it narrowly and thoughtfully.

“You thought, of course, that this was your necklace when you recovered possession of it yesterday?” he asked.

“It seemed to me the exact article with which I parted three years ago,” answered Burgoyne.

“The setting, now?” suggested the jeweller. “Do you recognize that? It is, you see, obviously old, of an old-fashioned pattern, a good deal worn, and somewhat discoloured. But of such a setting as this it would be quite easy to make an exact duplicate in a few days.”

“I am not certain that what you now hold in your hands is the setting of my diamonds,” said Burgoyne.

“Then the matter is plain,” said Mr. Levanter. “During the time that your necklace was in the hands of—of the acquaintance you referred to, it was taken out of his safe, and a very well and cleverly made imitation was substituted for it. That—er—acquaintance, now—was he quite honest, Captain Burgoyne?”

“I believe he was perfectly honest,” replied Burgoyne. “I can’t bring myself to think that he would do what you suggest has been done.”

“What certainly has been done,” said the jeweller. “But do you know what became of your necklace while it was in the hands of this acquaintance?”

“Yes, I do. In my presence it was sealed up and deposited in his safe,” Burgoyne answered. “There it remained until his death, when, in consequence of written orders from him, his daughter and his solicitor removed it to the bank from which it was fetched yesterday morning. And to cut matters short—both solicitor and daughter are above suspicion.”

“Quite so,” said Mr. Levanter. “Then I think one can come to only one conclusion: the substitution of the false for the real was done by some person who had access to your acquaintance’s safe—during his lifetime.”

Burgoyne looked steadily at the jeweller for a moment as if taking in the full effect of his words, as if realizing all that they meant.

“Ah!” he said at last. “Yes—I think you’re right. During his lifetime, eh? Yes—it must have been. During his lifetime, of course.”

Mr. Levanter coughed discreetly behind his white fingers.

“May I ask if this—er—acquaintance was a business man?” he said.

“He was—a business man.”

“Employing clerks—assistants?”

“Yes—some.”

Mr. Levanter nodded as if he wished to confirm his opinions to some person whom he saw in his mind’s eye.

“He was a very foolish man, your deceased acquaintance, to keep such valuable property in an office safe,” he remarked.

Burgoyne rose from his chair. He picked up the necklace and looked at the imitation stones half-carelessly.

“Now that I think of things from the present standpoint,” he said, “I am afraid he was foolish. However, as there is nothing very valuable about the necklace now, I am going to ask you to lock it up in your safe, Mr. Levanter. Wrap it securely, and let us both affix our seals to the package—until it is wanted.”

“You are going to track down your thief?” asked the jeweller as he produced materials for complying with Burgoyne’s request.

“I am going to try,” answered Burgoyne. “Certainly, I am going to try. But until I give you permission, Mr. Levanter, not a word of this to a soul. I am going to see what a little quiet work will do.”

He walked slowly along Bond Street when he emerged from Mr. Levanter’s shop, and was so much engrossed with his own thoughts that he failed to see a great many people who would fain have caught the famous traveller’s eye. And at the corner of Piccadilly he got into a taxi-cab and bade the driver go to Norfolk Street. He lounged back in the cab, his hat pulled over his eyes, and thought. And by the time he had come to Abbotsbury House he had tabulated his ideas in rough but fairly comprehensive fashion.

1. He was sure that what he had handed to Barclay Leverton was a necklace of real diamonds.

2. He found it impossible to believe that Leverton would cheat him.

3. It was equally impossible to believe that either Mr. Winch or Miss Leverton would cheat him.

4. It would be ridiculous to even wonder if the substitution of the imitation for the genuine could have been made while the bank had possession of the necklace.

5. The crime must have been committed at or engineered from Leverton’s office.

“And don’t I remember that they told me that Leverton had been ill and away from this office for some time before his death, and that the necklace was only removed on the very morning of his death?” he mused. “Ah, ah! I had need find out for myself what it is that goes on behind all the plate glass and polished mahogany! This may be a more tortuous and puzzling path than any I ever trod. However, here goes for the first footsteps. Let me see—I want Mr. John Carsdale. On business, of course—quite innocent business.”

Mr. Carsdale was in—as events proved, Mr. Carsdale was partaking of a cup of afternoon tea in Mrs. Walsingham’s room, with Mrs. Walsingham and Mr. Shrewsbury. Richard dragged Burgoyne in without ceremony; he had taken to doing as he liked at Carsdale’s, and Griffkin adored him because he was generous in the matter of half-crowns. And hearing Burgoyne’s voice through the half-open door, he darted out and ushered him in as if he himself were lord and master.

“But I came to see Mr. Carsdale on business,” said Burgoyne, accepting, nevertheless, a cup of the best China tea and a slice of cake at Mrs. Walsingham’s hands.

“That’s all right,” said Richard. “Carsdale isn’t a conventional man of business. He can do business over a tea-pot. And if its about the company you’re thinking of getting up, Burgoyne, I’ve already given him a hint of it—I knew you wouldn’t mind.”

Burgoyne glanced at Carsdale. Although his own doings in the world had been confined to his military duties and to his travels, he had cultivated whatever opportunities had ever been afforded him in respect to watching other men, and of deducing from their expression of lip or eye what their inner thought might be, and he now fancied that he detected on Carsdale’s face a certain suggestion of wariness. Therefore he himself assumed an air of almost careless indifference.

“I don’t know what our young friend there may have told you,” he said, addressing Carsdale. “Something very couleur de rose, no doubt. But the fact is, that all I wanted to ask you at present is—supposing I do decide to go in for forming a company to develop my ventures in South America—may I consult you in the initial stages? I know nothing of company promoting, and I understand you do.”

“Oh, with pleasure, with pleasure!” responded Carsdale. “Pray command me at any moment, Captain Burgoyne—I shall be only too pleased to give you the benefit of whatever experience I may have.”

“And he has more experience than any man in London!” declared Richard, confidently. “Put the matter in Carsdale’s hands, and you’ll be all right, Burgoyne.”

Burgoyne replied that he would certainly call on Mr. Carsdale when the matter was ripe, and would make an appointment with him. And presently he rose to go. Whereupon Richard said that he and Mrs. Walsingham were going up town in his motor, which was down below, and offered his friend a lift to anywhere in their direction. Burgoyne declined the lift, but went down to the street with them, and there took the opportunity of offering his congratulations to Mrs. Walsingham, upon whose hand he had already noticed the ring which Richard had bought that morning. Mrs. Walsingham received his polite sayings with becoming modesty; she seemed, however, at a loss for words wherewith to answer them, and her youthful cavalier cut in upon her confusion in his usual impetuous manner.

“I say, Burgoyne!” he exclaimed. “What about those diamonds of yours? If you’ll sell them, I’ll buy them. Will you?”

Burgoyne turned upon him slowly.

“Oh!” he said. “Those diamonds, Dick? No—I’ve decided not to sell them, after all. Not even to you.”

Richard manifested disappointment.

“Oh, well!” he said. “Of course, they are family heirlooms, aren’t they? By the by, what were they valued at?”

“You’re not a buyer, you know,” said Burgoyne, with a laugh. “Oh, well—I don’t mind telling you. My diamonds, Dick, are worth twelve thousand. But, as I said, I’m not going to sell them—just yet, anyway. So restrain your covetous soul.”

Then he raised his hat to Mrs. Walsingham, who had stepped into the car, and went off towards the Strand, once more engrossed in thought. And presently he muttered to himself a certain question, which had been repeating itself in his brain for the last hour: “Who was it opened that safe when Leverton was ill—who—who?”

CHAPTER XV
MRS. WALSINGHAM ADMITS

Mrs. Walsingham had listened to the brief conversation between Burgoyne and Richard with an interest which she had taken care not to show. She had had an idea that Burgoyne was watching her while he talked, as if he had wanted to observe the effect of the conversation upon her; the same feeling had been upon her upstairs. And it had seemed to her that when Richard had first mentioned the diamonds, Burgoyne had given her a sharp glance, which she had pretended not to see.

“And yet,” she thought, as the car got away from Norfolk Street, “it may have been all fancy, all nervousness, on my part. Didn’t I hear him say that his diamonds were worth twelve thousand? If he thinks that, then, of course, he hasn’t found out anything, and I dare say everything is all right—yet.”

But Mrs. Walsingham was not the sort of woman to leave any concern of hers, however small, to chance, and she meant to know precisely where she was. Wherefore, later in the evening, when she and Richard were dining at a very fashionable restaurant to which they had taken a fancy because it was so exclusive as to be very quiet, she brought round the conversation to the events of the afternoon, intent on improving her knowledge.

“What were those diamonds that you and Captain Burgoyne were talking about this afternoon, just before you got into the car?” she asked, with a good assumption of fairly interested indifference.

“Oh!” answered Richard, who had already forgotten all about the diamonds. “Didn’t I tell you? Burgoyne has a diamond necklace which is believed to have been the property of—what was the name of Napoleon’s wife, or, at any rate, one of them?”

“I don’t know,” answered Mrs. Walsingham. “I’m not good at the history of anything that doesn’t concern me.”

“I remember, now,” continued Richard. “Maria Louisa. It’s been in the Burgoyne family over a hundred years—you’ve never heard of it, then?”

Mrs. Walsingham favoured her fiancé with an upward glance of her beautiful eyes.

“How should I have ever heard of it?” she asked. “I never saw Captain Burgoyne until he came to the office the other day.”

“Oh, I thought, perhaps——” began Richard, and then he paused. It had been on the tip of his tongue to tell her that the famous necklace had lain in pawn in Leverton’s safe, within a yard or two of herself, for three years, but a sudden instinct stopped him as he reflected that no one but Burgoyne, Francis Leverton, Mr. Winch and himself knew of the transaction. “No, hang it!” he thought. “I mustn’t talk of Burgoyne’s private affairs. Oh, I fancied you might have heard of it,” he continued, aloud, “seeing that it’s a bit famous, you know. However, Burgoyne was talking of it this morning when he breakfasted with me, and he said he thought he’d sell it, and I offered to buy it—that’s all.”

“He said it was valued at twelve thousand,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “What did you want to buy a diamond necklace worth that for?”

“To give to you, of course,” answered Richard. “Every man gives his wife diamonds.”

“Every man does nothing of the sort. You must not think of such a thing, Richard,” said Mrs. Walsingham with a fine air of wifely protection. “I should be miserable if I thought that you believed me to be that sort of woman who is perpetually expecting gifts of that sort. Do be a sensible boy!—I suppose that if Burgoyne had been willing to sell, you’d have written a cheque for twelve thousand there and then?”

Richard laughed. At that time, what with his knowledge of his investments, his prospects, and his boundless faith in Carsdale, twelve thousand pounds seemed a mere bagatelle to expend on the woman one was going to marry.

“I suppose I should!” he said.

“How foolish—and how thoughtless!” exclaimed Mrs. Walsingham. “Pray, what do either you or Burgoyne know about the value of such things? I’m sure you, at any rate, couldn’t tell whether a stone such as this, for instance, is worth five pounds or five hundred pounds.”

“No,” said Richard, “I couldn’t. But,” he added, with a smile of great wisdom, “jewellers can, being experts. Burgoyne took his necklace to Levanter’s this morning, just to have it valued. You know Levanter’s?—I should think they know the worth of diamonds!”

Mrs. Walsingham, who was just then eating an ice, and qualifying its coldness with her own pet liqueur, received with seeming indifference the highly important information which she had been angling for.

“Oh!” she said. “So Levanter valued it at twelve thousand, did he? Of course he would know. But promise me, Richard”—here she took advantage of the fact that they were quite alone in a nook-and-corner to lay a hand on Richard’s and to give his a slight pressure—“promise me that you’ll never, never, never buy these or any other diamonds without consulting me? You see, I know how impetuous you are, and there are so many dishonest people about.”

Richard felt touched at this kindly desire to shield him.

“All right, Sylvie,” he said. “Of course, I won’t. I know you know a lot more than I do. Though it would have been all right buying these things from Burgoyne on Levanter’s valuation, wouldn’t it?”

“Oh, of course!” replied Mrs. Walsingham, sweetly. “But you are not to buy them—on Levanter’s valuation or anybody else’s.”

Levanter’s valuation! That was what puzzled her. When she was alone that night she sat down to think things out. Like all people who live by their wits, she was more or less of an adept at presenting matters to herself, as well as to others, in a clear and lucid fashion, and it did not take her long to sum up the present position of affairs. And when the summing up was done, Mrs. Walsingham’s pretty face was puckered with lines which indicated that she was puzzled and doubtful. She knew that she ought not to allow her face to be puckered, that she ought not to frown, that, whatever happened, she ought to keep on smiling, since smiles are conducive to a youthful appearance and frowns are not. But the situation was embarrassing, even if it was not awkward.

This was how Mrs. Walsingham summed it up. There was now no doubt in her mind that Burgoyne had redeemed his pledge from Frances Leverton and Mr. Septimus Winch acting as executors of Barclay Leverton. He had taken what they handed to him as being the real necklace which he had deposited with Leverton. And what he had been so handed he had that very morning—according to Richard—shown to Levanter, and Levanter had valued it at twelve thousand pounds.

This was what puzzled Mrs. Walsingham more than anything had ever puzzled her in her life—that Levanter should put such a value on something which she knew only too well was worth—well, never mind what. And she had smoked several cigarettes before she came to the conclusion that Levanter had never really examined the necklace. She reconstructed the scene for herself. Burgoyne had probably had the necklace on him; he had pulled it out, shown it to the jeweller, and asked, in an off-hand way, what such an article should be worth. And Levanter, not examining it over carefully or critically, perhaps not even handling it, but forming a rough idea from long experience, had answered that it should be worth about twelve thousand—and Burgoyne had put his property in his pocket again. That was it, that must be it!—there could be no other explanation.

But—that did not answer the question which she was putting to herself, had been putting to herself ever since she had found out that what passed for the genuine necklace was undoubtedly in Burgoyne’s possession. That question was a plain one. It was an unmistakably plain question. And it was packed easily into five simple words—

“How long am I safe?”

She went on reckoning up all the pros and cons of the case as she sat there, long after midnight, smoking. The whole place was very quiet, for Sophie Guyner had gone to bed, and there was not even the ticking of a clock to disturb her. But she thought so intently that she never noticed whether the quietness was deep or not; she would have thought matters out in the crowded streets of the City.

How long was she safe? Burgoyne might change his mind—he might decide to sell the necklace. The purchaser-in-prospect would certainly have the valuable article valued on which he was to lay out so much; then would follow inevitable inquiry—not as to everything, but as to so much of everything as would certainly lead to unpleasant investigations into the character, history and antecedents of everybody who had been in connection with Barclay Leverton during the past three years. And, as one of the people who had been very closely connected with the top floor of Abbotsbury House, but much more as the prospective bride of a young man who was worth three hundred thousand pounds, Mrs. Walsingham had no desire for inquiries or investigations of any sort, and she knew quite well that Mr. John Carsdale would share her feelings.

She threw away her last cigarette as she thought of Carsdale. And her puzzled countenance suddenly cleared as she began to make ready for her night’s rest.

“I may as well make a clean breast of it to Jack,” she thought. “After all, two heads are better than one.”

Then she slept like an innocent child—and in the morning awoke refreshed and ready for the fray. And beginning to exercise her generalship at once, she telephoned to Richard, and told him that he was on no account to present himself at Abbotsbury House before five o’clock that day: she had arrears of work, she said, which had accumulated through his habit of dropping in at any hour he chose to, and they must be cleared off. She spoke imperatively, and Richard promised to obey; she was just as imperative later on, at the office, when, at noon, Miss Rousby and Griffkin being out, taking much needed refreshment at neighbouring places of popular resort, she informed Carsdale that she wanted to have a talk to him.

Carsdale knew from experience that a certain tone in Mrs. Walsingham’s voice, a certain look in her eye, meant that she wanted to have his most serious advice on some equally serious matter. He followed her into her room, and took a chair at her desk.

“There’s nobody can interrupt,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “The girl and the boy are out, and I’ve put up the notice at the door. Jack—I’m in a devil of a mess! It may spoil all—for both of us. So each of us has just got to think pretty hard.”

Carsdale lighted a cigar—it was his way of showing that he was all attention. And Mrs. Walsingham proceeded.

“You remember when Captain Burgoyne first came here the other day?” she asked.

“Of course,” replied Carsdale.

“But you didn’t know why he came?”

“Came to see Leverton—who happened to be dead.”

“He came to redeem something on which Leverton had advanced him some money,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “It wasn’t here, of course. Frances and old Winch took it away the day of Leverton’s death.”

“What was it?” asked Carsdale, still only mildly curious. “Anything good?”

“It was a diamond necklace, worth about eleven or twelve thousand pounds,” replied Mrs. Walsingham.

Carsdale stared.

“Great Scott!” he exclaimed. “I didn’t know that Leverton ever did anything of that sort. How did you come to hear of it?”

“Found it out,” answered Mrs. Walsingham. “He lent Burgoyne five thousand pounds towards the expenses of his expedition and held the diamond necklace as security. Burgoyne came to pay principal and interest the other day, and as Leverton was dead, of course, he had to go to Winch’s.”

“I remember—I remember!” said Carsdale. “Yes—of course, I didn’t know why he came here. Oh, yes, to be sure, Shrewsbury went over there to Winch’s with him.”

Mrs. Walsingham gave her vis-à-vis a keen look.

“That, of course, is how I have been able to supplement what information I already had,” she observed; “the boy and Burgoyne are friends.”

“Just so,” said Carsdale. “Yes? Well—I suppose Burgoyne paid his money and took his security. Yes?”

“He paid the five thousand pounds and the interest on it for three years,” replied Mrs. Walsingham. “And they handed over to him what they and he believed to be the diamond necklace which he had given to Leverton.”

Carsdale suddenly started and faced sharply round.

“Believed!” he exclaimed. “Then—it wasn’t?”

“It wasn’t,” said Mrs. Walsingham.

“Then where—where is the real one?” demanded Carsdale.

Mrs. Walsingham bent over the desk and sank her voice to a whisper.

“I’ve got it!” she answered.

CHAPTER XVI
CONSPIRATORS

Carsdale was not often surprised, but he was so much surprised by Mrs. Walsingham’s frank admission that he dropped his cigar. And when he had picked it up and again confronted her, his eyes were still wide with astonishment.

“You’ve got it?” he exclaimed. “You?”

“I!” answered Mrs. Walsingham, calmly. “I!”

Carsdale took a few pulls at his cigar, regained his composure, and lay back in his chair.

“Oh!” he said at last. “Very well. Now, as we’re quite free from interruption, you’d better tell me all about it. Of course, Sylvie, you—stole it?”

“I took it from Mr. Leverton’s safe—certainly,” she answered. “It wasn’t difficult to do that. What wasn’t easy was to get a duplicate made—a duplicate of such good workmanship as to the setting, and such fine paste as to the stones, as to be a perfect facsimile.”

Carsdale slapped his knee.

“A facsimile—a duplicate?” he said. “I see—I see! Then—it is the duplicate which Burgoyne carried away from Winch’s?”

“Precisely,” she answered.

“You substituted the imitation for the original in Leverton’s safe, then?” said Carsdale, with a nod at the wall. “That was clever. Ah! And the duplicate——”

“Was so good that nobody could have seen any difference between it and the real thing,” said Mrs. Walsingham. “But you know, Jack, all these things come to light in the end, and the first time Burgoyne has that duplicate examined by an expert, or even by a good jeweller, he’ll find out he’s been cheated.”

“Well?” said Carsdale. “Well? I knew that, of course.”

“And he won’t suspect Leverton,” continued Mrs. Walsingham, “and he won’t suspect Frances, nor Winch, and, of course, he won’t suspect the bankers. He’ll suspect—you and me!”

“Good God!” exclaimed Carsdale. “Why us?”

“Because we had free access to Leverton’s room, there, during his illness—and at other times,” replied Mrs. Walsingham.

Carsdale nodded his agreement of this view.

“Yes,” he said, after due deliberation. “Yes, I suppose he will. And then——”

“And then he’ll begin inquiring and investigating, and no doubt setting private agents to work,” continued Mrs. Walsingham, “and a good deal might, or, rather, would be found out that——”

“Yes, yes!” interrupted Carsdale, impatiently. “Cut all that out—I know it by heart. Well, Sylvie?” Mrs. Walsingham looked at him fixedly.

“Well?” she said. “Well, then it wouldn’t be well! It would be all up with my engagement to the boy, and he’d take all his business out of your hands, and——”

“And it seems to me you’ve gone a good way to land both of us in a nice mess!” he broke in, half-angrily. “Why did you do it? It was—theft!”

Mrs. Walsingham’s lip curled.

“Oh, don’t let’s get to fine distinctions,” she said scornfully. “There are all sorts of ways of thieving—you know the delicately polite ones. I took it because—I wanted it.”

Carsdale growled inarticulately and began to look sullen.

“Where is the damned thing?” he asked. “Sold, I suppose?”

“Pawned,” answered Mrs. Walsingham.

“How much?” he asked.

“A thousand,” she said. “It’s a private arrangement, and the thing’s safe. Never mind that—I want us to use our brains.”

“In what way?” asked Carsdale, gazing at her sulkily. “The thing’s done.”

“No!” she said. “It’s beginning. The great thing is to prevent any scandal arising. Now, listen, Jack. It’s evident that Burgoyne believes himself to be in possession of the real thing. He isn’t. How would it be to put him in possession of it—I mean the absolutely, real thing—before his suspicions are aroused?”

Carsdale’s ears pricked at the suggestion of intrigue and craft. He sat up in his chair and threw away his cigar.

“How?” he asked, with newly-awakened interest.

Mrs. Walsingham picked up a sheet of paper from her desk and began to tear it into strips—a sure sign in her, as Carsdale knew, that she was devising plans. He let her take her time, and meanwhile made some mental reflections of his own on her revelations, which had taken him not a little aback.

“Well,” she said, at last, having torn two or three sheets of note-paper into ribbons. “There are ways. I could, for instance, redeem the necklace——”

“Naturally, if you’ve got the money,” said Carsdale. “That’s an important detail, Sylvie.”

Mrs. Walsingham gave him a glance which was intended to warn him not to interpolate irrelevant remarks, and went on.

“I could, I say, redeem the thing and send it to him in such a fashion that he would never know where it came from,” she continued. “But that would never do, because we’re not concerned with making restitution, and, so far, he doesn’t know that he hasn’t got the real necklace. What I want to do is put the real necklace back into his possession before he even finds out that it’s ever been—stolen. Do you see that—do you understand it?”

“Perfectly,” answered Carsdale. “This is the position. The gentleman—we’ll call him B—doesn’t know that he has been robbed. C, who has robbed him, doesn’t want him to know. Therefore C designs to restore to him that of which he has been robbed before he discovers his loss. That’s it, eh?”

“You’ve got it,” said Mrs. Walsingham.

Carsdale lighted another cigar.

“Unfortunately,” he said, dryly, “unfortunately, there’s a serious feature of the case. The gentleman believes himself to be in actual, material, bodily possession of the very article which has been abstracted. In plain English, Sylvie, Burgoyne thinks he’s got the necklace. How’re you going to get over that, eh?”

Mrs. Walsingham laughed gently.

“That’s my great plan, Jack,” she said. “By—substitution.”

“Substitution?” he said. “You mean——”

“I mean by substituting the necklace which I have for the one he has,” replied Mrs. Walsingham. “Giving him the real in exchange for the false, don’t you see?”

Mr. Carsdale did see, and he nodded his head admiringly.

“That’s a clever notion, Sylvie,” he said, “and you’re a clever woman for hitting on it. And—a mere detail—how are you going to put it into execution?”

Mrs. Walsingham again began to tear up sheets of paper. And, when she next spoke, she bent her eyes over her task instead of looking at her companion. “Haven’t you got some hold over that man, Kedgin, Richard’s valet?” she asked, a little diffidently.

Carsdale laughed—and there was something in his laugh, which she did not like. “Well?” he asked.

“Burgoyne is taking up his quarters with Richard for a few weeks,” she went on, still busied with her task. “Kedgin will valet him.”

“According to what Richard says, Burgoyne always carries that necklace in his pocket,” Mrs. Walsingham continued, “so that I thought that if——”

Carsdale laughed again.

“Let me finish your sentence for you,” he said. “You thought that as I have a hold on Kedgin I could get him to substitute the true necklace for the false one. Good, Sylvie—but it won’t do. And for a very simple reason—it is quite true that I have a hold on Mr. William Kedgin, as you say. But I don’t propose to give Mr. Kedgin a hold on me.”

Mrs. Walsingham looked up and threw away her scraps of paper.

“Very well,” she said. “Then I must do it myself.”

Carsdale nodded approvingly.

“Better, much better, Sylvie!” he said. “But—how?”

“I haven’t quite thought that out yet,” she answered. “But I shall. It can be done. It’s got to be done—and done soon.”

Carsdale got slowly out of his chair and began to stride about the room, puffing out clouds of cigar-smoke.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said, after a period of thought. “An idea occurs to me. Didn’t Shrewsbury say something about giving a dinner to Burgoyne, and asking you and me to meet him? Yes—well, get him to give it at his rooms—you can persuade him to anything—tell him we shall be more comfortable—no, tell him you’ve taken a fancy to dine there. He’s floods of wine, and he can have the dinner sent in. That’s point one—d’you see?”

“I see,” she answered.

“Very well. Point two,” continued Carsdale. “We dine. Over the wine and walnuts, or their modern equivalents, we lead the conversation to diamonds, and you express a wish to see the famous necklace which once encircled the throat of—never mind who she was—Marie Antoinette?—oh, Maria Louisa. Very good—Burgoyne cannot refuse a lady. The necklace is produced and handed round—eventually it comes into my hands, Sylvie. Do you remember that I used to amuse myself with conjuring tricks?”

Mrs. Walsingham’s eyes suddenly brightened. She nodded eagerly.

“Yes—yes!” she answered. “I do!”

“Well—I’m still good enough to do a few good tricks at children’s parties,” said Carsdale, laughing. “Now, listen. The imitation necklace, I say, comes into my hands. You have already provided me with the real one. Hey presto!—the thing is done! I change one for the other.”

Mrs. Walsingham rose.

“That seems the plan of campaign, Jack,” she said. “Very good. I’m going to redeem the real thing now, and then I’ll set to work on the dinner business—there’ll be no difficulty about that.”

“You’ve got the money?” asked Carsdale. “If not—”

“Thanks, but I have,” she said, tapping her handbag. “And it’s my own, too. I only pawned it for a thousand—to keep it safe.”

“I’m not yet quite sure why you—annexed it!” said Carsdale.

“For a reserve fund—in case anything ever happened,” she answered, looking steadily at him. “I figured the whole thing out, and I saw that I stood to win. Burgoyne might never have come back, you see.”

“Yes,” said Carsdale. “Yes, of course. It was a good, sporting chance.” He leaned his arms over the top of the desk and smiled at her whimsically. “I’ve a notion,” he said. “If Burgoyne would have sold, why not have let Shrewsbury buy the imitation necklace as the real one? Then you have ’em both in your possession, and you destroy the false and keep the genuine—and diamonds don’t lose much value, you know.”

“Yes, but Burgoyne won’t sell,” she answered. “I’d had some idea like that. At first he thought he would sell, and then, yesterday afternoon, he said definitely, in my presence, that he wouldn’t. But that would have been a good plan. The great thing is to so arrange matters that he never knows—the truth.”

“Ye-es,” agreed Carsdale. “Ye-es, that’s so. I should say, from the looks of him, that if that chap were set on a trail he’d keep his nose to earth until he’d run something down. Better get on with everything as quickly as possible, Sylvie—especially the dinner. And—leave the conjuring to me.”

So Mrs. Walsingham went out, and it being lunch time, she ate and drank with a relieved mind. She had been seriously concerned when she thought of what might—nay, would!—happen if Ralph Burgoyne discovered the truth; now, knowing Carsdale’s powers, resource and coolness in emergencies, she felt that the gods were fighting for her. It would be no difficult matter for a sharp man like Carsdale to substitute one necklace for the other: he would do it easily. And that done, no one would ever know of what she had done, and she would marry Richard and his money—and be safe.

She went off after she had lunched, and redeemed the precious necklace, and she carried it back to Abbotsbury House in her handbag, and there—Carsdale being out—locked it up in a secret drawer until she went home. After which, she condescended to business for the rest of the afternoon.

But at five o’clock Richard came in, and she saw at once, from a mere look at his face, that he had something to tell her.

“I say, Sylvie!” he exclaimed. “I lunched with Burgoyne—he came for me to the club. And, I say, he says that he’ll sell me that necklace, after all—it’s a white elephant to him. And he swears that he won’t take more than ten thousand for it. I told him I wouldn’t do anything without consulting you, so he gave it to me to show you. Here it is!—and you must let me give it to you, Sylvie—you must!” And he placed on the blotter-pad before her the counterfeit of the real thing which lay in security only a few feet away.

CHAPTER XVII
A STUDENT OF PROBLEMS

When Burgoyne left Mrs. Walsingham and Richard Shrewsbury at the door of Abbotsbury House and went off asking himself the ever-recurring question as to the opening of the safe, he was also conscious that another very unpleasant impression was rapidly forcing itself to an absolute conviction in his mind—namely, that Richard was in the hands of unscrupulous people. Long habit had helped Burgoyne to sum up character quickly; he was well aware that he had not been favourably impressed by either Carsdale or Mrs. Walsingham; what he had seen of them that afternoon had not impressed him any more favourably. He had been quick to observe a certain wariness in Carsdale’s manner towards himself; a certain watchfulness in Mrs. Walsingham’s beautiful eyes: each, in some strange and subtle fashion, seemed to suggest, more than to show, a certain suspicion of him, as if they secretly wondered what he was after. The more he thought over the signs, circumstances, facts, the less he liked their look; he had privately thought his young friend from Trinidad a fool for becoming engaged to a woman of whom it was impossible he could know much; now he became seriously alarmed about him.

“I’m afraid my diamond necklace is a mere detail, a paltry incident,” he thought, as he strolled westward along the crowded Strand. “If those people really have had a hand in cheating me out of it, they’re quite capable of helping themselves pretty freely to Master Dick’s money. The woman can do it by settlements, and presents, and heaven knows what, and all in a legal way; the man seems as astute a person as I’ve seen in my time. And the question as usual, is—what to do?”

Burgoyne began to cast about in his mind for some answer to this question. And looking in one direction after another, and turning up one path only to retrace his steps and take a second, he suddenly thought of a name, and at the thought threw up his head with an involuntary exclamation thereby arousing the wonder of sundry approaching pedestrians who had been attracted by his bronzed face and keen eyes.

“By Jove!” he said. “Gavin Blair!”

Then, as he shouldered his way along, a little more quickly, he muttered: “The very man—if I can lay hands on him.”

At the thought of Gavin Blair, Burgoyne’s mind turned a long way back. He remembered days at Sandhurst, when he and Blair were boys together; he remembered after-days at Aldershot, and at various more or less dismal garrison towns in England and Ireland, when they were subalterns in the same foot regiment; he remembered certain foreign stations, and at any rate, one little experience of active service in which Blair had lost his left arm, and thereby got his dismissal from all soldiering for ever. But more than these things, he remembered Blair’s peculiar bent from his earliest years. Although he was a keen and hard working soldier, he had many other interests—he had always shown a great taste for literature, for art, and for music. And when he had been obliged to leave the Army, he had turned to what had been his hobbies as subjects for the serious business of life, and before Burgoyne had left England on his last expedition, had become widely known as the author of two or three remarkable novels in which psychology played a considerable part, and as an art critic of no mean order.

But beyond his creative and critical faculties, Blair possessed another which just then appealed to Burgoyne with particular force. He had always taken a delight in working out curious and intricate problems, and on more than one occasion had achieved results so surprisingly true and accurate, that Burgoyne had put his ability down to some remarkable hereditary gift not unconnected with his Gaelic ancestry. Amongst his friends Blair had made a reputation for seeing to the bottom of things with amazing clearness and speed; difficult problems which puzzled really clever heads were solved by him with a sureness that was almost uncanny. And Burgoyne remembered his name with a great sense of relief. Gavin Blair was the very man he wanted.

Turning a little aside from the throng, Burgoyne took out a much-worn pocket-book, and found a page on which the pencilled memoranda had grown almost illegible. But he was able to make out Blair’s address, and he drew out his watch.

“Half-past five,” he murmured. “I’ll drive down there on the chance.”

Blair lived—or had lived when the address which Burgoyne had just consulted was written—in a palatial building, given up to flats, which overlooked the Thames from the excellent vantage point of the Chelsea Embankment. Burgoyne, entering the hall of this building from his taxi-cab, was greatly relieved to see his old friend’s name still showing on the list of tenants; he was still more relieved when, on knocking at Blair’s outer door, it was opened almost immediately, by Blair himself—a tall, athletic-looking man, grizzled of hair and moustache, who, but for the empty sleeve pinned up to his tweed jacket, would have been taken for one who was continually engaged in something that required physical exertion. He stretched out a big hand, looking steadily at his visitor out of steel-blue eyes.

“Come in, Burgoyne,” he said quietly. “I was expecting you.”

Burgoyne gripped the big hand and followed its owner across an entrance hall into a wide spaced room overlooking the river—a room which seemed to be full of books and pictures and papers, and of a grand piano in a wonderful case, and yet communicated an idea of airiness and breadth. He dropped into the chair which Blair drew forward and looked at his old friend with a certain curious questioning in his eyes.

“You were expecting me!” he said. “Do you mean—now?”

“Now,” replied Blair. “It is not five minutes since, writing at that desk, I suddenly said to myself, ‘Ralph Burgoyne is coming here—he is almost here.’ So I put the writing aside. Have a drink—and help yourself to what you want in the way of tobacco.”

Burgoyne picked a cigarette out of a box and lighted it thoughtfully.

“So the old instinct, or power, or whatever it is, is still there?” he said. “But I supposed it would be. And that’s why I came down just now. Of course, I was coming to find you as soon as I could. I’ve a lot to do, as you’ll readily understand. But I want your advice. I’ve a difficult problem before me, and I believe you’re the one man in London who can help to a proper solution of it. Do you mind if I tell you about it—now.”

Blair filled a big briarwood pipe out of a curious old tobacco jar, and sat down in an easy chair in front of Burgoyne.

“Now, go ahead,” he said. “And don’t forget to begin at the very beginning, and to tell everything, and don’t hurry—my time is my own.”

“Thanks,” said Burgoyne. “Very well, then—to begin at the beginning....”

Blair had smoked three pipes and the evening was drawing on by the time Burgoyne made an end of his story. He told it as clearly, yet as fully, as he could, from the time of his negotiations with Barclay Leverton to that afternoon; he told of how he had come to know young Richard Shrewsbury; he reiterated his belief in Barclay Leverton and in his daughter, and in Mr. Winch; he expressed his curious suspicions of Carsdale and of Mrs. Walsingham. And Blair listened quietly and steadily, rarely interrupting except to ask a question on some point of fact.

“And that’s all,” said Burgoyne, at last. “Now you know everything. Tell me what you think when you’re ready to tell.”

Blair took his big pipe out of his mouth and blew a spiral of smoke towards the ceiling.

“I can tell you something of what I think now,” he said. “I think your necklace is going to be a means of salvation for that youngster.”

Burgoyne gave his friend a puzzled look.

“Yes?” he said. “I should be glad to think that anything of mine would do him good. But—how?”

“Because I have not the slightest doubt in the world that she is the guilty party,” answered Blair. “The man—Carsdale—may be in it, but I should say not. Now, if you can establish the woman’s guilt, establish it so completely that there can be no doubt about it, there will be no marriage. No lad of that sort, however chivalrous he may be, and however impressionable, will marry a thief.”

“Well,” said Burgoyne hesitatingly, “—ye-es—I see that. But—supposing there is a hasty marriage?”

“There won’t be a hasty marriage, in all probability, so long as her suspicions are not aroused,” answered Blair. “Wherefore, it behoves you to move with great caution. Alarm her, and you’ll have the boy rushing off to Doctors’ Commons for a special licence. Go slow, Burgoyne. But I think you need not fear a hasty marriage, on other grounds. She will want settlements, and so on. You have time.”

“But what’s to be done?” asked Burgoyne. “I don’t want publicity. I’m not going to call in police and detectives and all that sort of thing.”

“By no means,” said Blair. “I don’t think there’s any need: I think you can do much yourself. There are certain questions which suggest themselves to me at once. Let me tabulate them:—

“First. Who are Mr. John Carsdale and Mrs. Sylvie Walsingham in reality, and what were their relations with the late Barclay Leverton?

“Second. Under what conditions was Mrs. Walsingham living previous to the arrival of Richard Shrewsbury?

“And I have a third notion, which I will tell you of a little later. Now——”

“I can answer the second myself, at present,” said Burgoyne. “Shrewsbury has told me that Mrs. Walsingham lives in—well, a fairly luxurious state in an expensive flat.”

“Very well,” said Blair. “That is something to know. Now, as to the first question—you tell me that you met Miss Frances Leverton at the solicitor’s when you redeemed your property. What sort of young woman is she?”

Burgoyne gave himself up to a moment’s reflection.

“I should say a cool-headed, practical, business-like young woman,” he answered.

“The sort that can keep counsel if necessary?” asked Blair.

“I should say, emphatically, yes,” replied Burgoyne.

“You said that young Shrewsbury told you that Miss Leverton is, in some fashion, carrying on her father’s business. Do you know where?”

“Yes, at her private residence in Maida Vale,” said Burgoyne. “I know that, because Shrewsbury wanted me to entrust some of my business to her, and I said I wouldn’t.”

“Did you? Well, but I want you to do some business with her, now,” said Blair. “I have formed the opinion that Miss Leverton will prove most useful to you in this affair. Don’t ask me the whys and wherefores, but sit down at that desk and write what I am going to dictate. Now, write:—

“Dear Miss Leverton,—

“I understand that you are in some sense your father’s successor in business, and I should be glad to have an interview with you. I will call upon you to-morrow morning at 11 o’clock, and I shall take the liberty of bringing with me a friend, Captain Blair, who is interested in the matter.

“Yours faithfully,
“Ralph Burgoyne.”

“Now, Burgoyne,” continued Blair, “you will write that out on your own note-paper as soon as you get home, and post it to-night. To-morrow morning, I shall call for you at Shrewsbury’s rooms at half-past ten, and on our way to Maida Vale I shall coach you in what you’re to say to Miss Leverton on our arrival. And now, old boy, run away, for I have an article to finish before dinner—you must tell me all about your travels when—well, when we’ve got this very nasty affair over.”

So Burgoyne went off, not a little mystified by Blair’s advice, but fully trusting in it and wholly confident of his old friend’s powers, and in due course he transcribed the letter to Frances Leverton, who was as much surprised in receiving it as Burgoyne had been in taking it down from Blair’s dictation. She was a little nervous and fluttered when the two gentlemen were announced, but she remembered that her great desire in life was to cultivate a sternly business-like manner, and Blair was secretly amused at the somewhat off-hand manner in which she received them, pointing them to chairs, and resumed her seat at her desk.

“What can I do for you, Captain Burgoyne?” she asked, almost brusquely.

Burgoyne, carefully coached by Blair, looked into the lining of his hat. He showed signs of embarrassment.

“Well, the fact is, Miss Leverton,” he said, “the fact is—I wished to see you on a most important matter, which is also an unpleasant one.”

“Unpleasant?” said Frances.

“Unpleasant for me,” answered Burgoyne, still repeating his lesson. “You remember that I received from you and Mr. Winch the other day what purported to be the diamond necklace which I had deposited with your father?”

“Purported!” exclaimed Frances. “Purported, Captain Burgoyne?”

“I said purported, Miss Leverton,” repeated Burgoyne quietly. “You see, what I really did receive was a mere counterfeit—quite valueless—of my own property.”

CHAPTER XVIII
BLAIR’S THIRD NOTION

It required no particular powers of observation on the part of the two men who were watching her to see that Burgoyne’s announcement gave Frances Leverton the greatest surprise of her life. It was a surprise which did not show itself by any sudden rush of colour to her face, by any sudden starting of her body; rather, it left her outwardly calm and motionless, as if she had been turned into a statue. But presently, amidst the silence which had fallen upon all three of them, she lifted her hands to the elbows of her desk-chair, and, bending forward towards Burgoyne, spoke in what was little more than a whisper.

“Do you mean to tell me that what you took away from the bank was not your necklace—the Maria Louisa necklace?” she said. “Do you?”

Burgoyne was beginning to hate the situation. He thought there was something to admire in this girl; in her direct gaze, her candid and fearless expression; it was unpleasant to feel that she was being dragged into all this miserable and sordid story of theft.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “But—it wasn’t.”

Frances bent still nearer.

“It was not what you gave my father?” she said in intent tones.

“No,” answered Burgoyne. “No!”

“Then—it was an imitation, a duplicate?” she asked.

Burgoyne inclined his head—for speech he was feeling less and less desire. But the girl went on.

“Then this imitation must have been substituted for the real article while it was in my father’s possession?” she said.

“I’m afraid so,” replied Burgoyne, miserably, and beginning to wish that he had never heard of the Maria Louisa necklace. “I’m afraid so. You see, Miss Leverton, I——”

But Frances suddenly interrupted him. She was sitting upright now, and there was a bright spot of colour on each cheek. She nodded at Captain Blair.

“Who is this gentleman?” she asked. “A detective?”

There was something in the girl’s tone that made Burgoyne wince. But Blair smiled and responded to Burgoyne’s direct glance at him.

“No, I am really what my card describes me to be, Miss Leverton,” he said. “But I am also a very old friend of Captain Burgoyne, to whom he came for counsel and advice in this matter. I advised him strongly to come straight to you and to tell you what has happened, and to——”

“And look here, Miss Leverton,” broke in Burgoyne, careless whether he interrupted Blair or not, “I want to tell you at once that I have no suspicion of—of——”

“Hush!” said Blair. “Miss Leverton need not be told that you have no suspicion of any one into whose hands the necklace came legitimately. She understands that by your coming to her.”

“If the real necklace is stolen, somebody must have stolen it,” said Frances coldly. “And it must have been stolen, and the false one substituted for it, while it was in my father’s possession.”

“Just so,” agreed Blair. “But—I think other people than your father had access to his room, from what Captain Burgoyne tells me. There were—pardon me—people about your father——”

“There were people about my father whom I wouldn’t have trusted with the value of a penny-piece!” the girl suddenly broke out. “My father was far too easy-going. People about him! My God—yes! What are you going to do?” she asked, turning on Burgoyne. “Tell me—what are you going to do?”

But it was Blair who answered.

“We are going to consult with you,” he said gently. “That’s what we came for. Captain Burgoyne does not want to make this matter public—he wants to pursue his own course. And—to begin with—he wants you to tell him all you know of two people who seem to have been considerably mixed up in your father’s affairs—I am sure you know whom I mean. And—there is a particular reason why he should know all about the—woman.”

Frances was watching Blair’s strong face with a growing interest. She felt that here was a personality.

“Why—about the woman?” she asked in a low voice.

Blair looked her directly in the eyes.

“Because young Mr. Shrewsbury has promised to marry her,” he replied.

For an instant a sudden flush of colour flamed into the girl’s cheeks, and Blair, after one quick glance at her, turned as quickly away to look at Burgoyne. And he was thankful to see that the explorer, who was evidently much troubled and concerned over the affair, or, rather, over the unpleasantness of bringing Frances into it, was at that moment engaged in the double task of endeavouring to gnaw off a part of the handle of his umbrella and at the same time to see something or other in the immaculate lining of his silk hat. And Blair himself, continuing to talk, kept his eyes for a while on the hearthrug at his feet, tracing out its pattern with his walking-cane. He had seen enough in that swift glance at the girl’s face, and he wanted her to regain her composure.

“Mr. Shrewsbury has become engaged to Mrs. Walsingham,” he continued. “Now, Mr. Shrewsbury is a very young, a very inexperienced man. He had no friends in this country when he arrived here; he was to be taken in easily by clever and unscrupulous people. Probably Captain Burgoyne has the greatest right of any one in England to consider himself Mr. Shrewsbury’s friend, for he knew him before the boy came here, and he knew his father, and had been his father’s guest, and he does not like to think that this very innocent youth is contracting a marriage with a woman of whom he knows nothing.”

He paused and looked at Frances. She had recovered herself by that time, and she was looking at him with an expression which he did not quite understand. Was she asking him to keep a secret which she had let slip for a moment, or—what? He turned to Burgoyne.

“Have I put that correctly, Burgoyne?” he said, still trifling to give Frances more time.

“Quite correctly, from my point,” answered Burgoyne, tearing himself away from the umbrella and the hat. “I’d rather forfeit the necklace altogether than know that the youngster was marrying a woman who—well, a woman that his father wouldn’t have liked him to marry. The father was a fine old chap.”

Blair turned again to Frances.

“Who is this woman, Miss Leverton?” he asked bluntly.

Frances opened out her hands.

“But I don’t know!” she answered. “I—I don’t know anything whatever about her except that she is—there.”

“Your father——” began Blair. But Frances stopped him.

“I’ll tell you, willingly, all I know about Mr. Carsdale and Mrs. Walsingham,” she said. “I have no liking for either of them, because I honestly believe them to be—well, anything but straight—but I won’t let that influence me in what I say. I first heard my father speak of Carsdale about six years ago, when I was thirteen or fourteen; my father used to tell me little business things, even then, because my mother was dead, and he had no one else to talk to. He said that he and Carsdale had entered into some sort of partnership in certain things, and that Carsdale was a very smart man, who could introduce business. Carsdale began coming here about that time, and I never liked him, though I never knew why. Then, about three years ago, my father said that he and Carsdale were going to have a lady secretary, a Mrs. Walsingham, who was Carsdale’s cousin, and a young widow, and that she was very clever in many ways. And so she came—and that is practically all I know.”

“Carsdale’s cousin, and a young widow?” said Blair. “Widow of whom?”

“Dick Shrewsbury,” broke in Burgoyne, “says that she’s the widow of some chap named Walsingham, who was making an expedition into Arabia or somewhere taking her with him, where he was killed by the natives, she being rescued by a friendly chief. But,” he added, with a sly glance at his companions, “although I said nothing to the youngster, I never heard of that affair, and I think I should have done.”

“A romantic story,” remarked Blair. “And one that could, I suppose, be traced to its origin. But, Miss Leverton—you are a business woman, and you doubtless have a good many business relations with City folk. The great thing to be desired in this matter is—privacy. Could you not find out—quietly—what Carsdale’s career was before he became associated with your father? He must have been occupied previous to that, you know.”

“But I believe he came from New York,” said Frances. “I don’t think he had been long in England when my father met him.”

Blair looked at Burgoyne.

“But Carsdale’s not an American, is he?” he asked.

“I should say, decidedly not,” answered Burgoyne. “He uses an occasional American phrase, but I should take him for a genuine Londoner, or, at any rate, an Englishman.”

Blair gave himself up to a moment’s reflection.

“The position seems to be this,” he said after awhile. “Carsdale appears to have floated over the present horizon six years ago; Mrs. Walsingham, his cousin, three years ago. During that time—in spite of your instinctive dislike of them, Miss Leverton—they seem to have run straight. Your father, for example, never complained of them?”

“No—never,” answered Frances. “No—never as regards himself. He used to laugh sometimes and say that Carsdale was as sharp as a Sheffield blade, and now and then he would make reference to Mrs. Walsingham as being a remarkably clever woman, but that was all. My father was somewhat curious in temperament—when he pleased he could be extremely close and reserved.”

“And when he died, I suppose the partnership accounts between himself and Carsdale were all right?” asked Blair.

“Oh, yes—that was easily adjusted and settled,” answered Frances. “Of late, my father had done little partnership business with Carsdale.”

“In short, you know nothing against Carsdale—or against the woman?” said Blair.

“Nothing—at least, nothing positive,” she replied.

“Then, for the present, let us turn our attention to the question of the necklace,” said Blair. “Now, Miss Leverton, as the genuine necklace was undoubtedly stolen while it was in your father’s keeping, you are naturally anxious that we should discover who stole it. I may take that for granted?”

“I am so anxious,” replied Frances, with emphasis, “that I will do anything I can to help in the discovery.”

“Very good,” said Blair. “Then first of all, let us all three understand that we are under a pledge of secrecy to each other. Now, Burgoyne, I told you that I had a third notion, and, as Miss Leverton is now well aware that we believe the real necklace is in Mrs. Walsingham’s possession, I will tell you what that notion is. You have told me that Shrewsbury wanted to buy your necklace, Burgoyne; that you were at first inclined to sell; that on finding what it was that you really had got, you refused to sell. Now, then, you are to follow my advice. You are—at once—to tell Shrewsbury that you have changed your mind, and that he can have the necklace for ten thousand pounds.”

Burgoyne who had fallen to contemplation of his hat’s lining, looked up with sheer amazement in his eyes.

“What on earth does that mean?” he exclaimed.

“Never mind,” replied Blair. “You are to do what I say. On leaving here, go straight to Levanter’s, get the paste necklace, contrive to see Shrewsbury as soon as possible, make him your offer, and hand the necklace to him—to be shown to Mrs. Walsingham. Do you follow all that?”

“I follow it—and I’ll do it, since you tell me to do it,” answered Burgoyne. “But I’m hanged if I know what it means.”

“Again, never mind—for the time being,” said Blair. “You will know. Now, I may as well tell you that Mrs. Walsingham will advise Shrewsbury to buy the necklace——”

“What, ten thousand pounds for mere paste!” exclaimed Burgoyne.

“She will tell him to buy,” continued Blair, imperturbably. “And he will buy, and he will give you his cheque. Lock the cheque up in safety—don’t even endorse it. And when that transaction is over, see me again.”

Blair rose, and Burgoyne slowly followed his example.

“Well, I really don’t know what you’re after, Blair,” he said, with a mystified shake of the head, “and I don’t know if Miss Leverton does—do you, Miss Leverton——?”

“I have a dim notion,” admitted Frances, with a glance at Blair.

“Very well—you’re cleverer, both of you, than I,” said Burgoyne. “I’ll follow the instructions to the very letter.”

“And later on,” said Blair, turning to Frances, “we shall—know more.”

Then they went away and drove back towards Bond Street, and for a time both men kept silence. But at last Blair turned to Burgoyne with a queer look.

“I believe we’re at the beginning of a striking episode, in which we shall rescue young Master Richard from the Philistines,” he said. “And I’ve a pretty good notion that we shall receive yeoman help from the young woman we’ve just left.”

“From her? Why?” demanded Burgoyne.

“Because I think she’s in love with the young gentleman,” answered Blair, drily.

CHAPTER XIX
THE MAN AT THE THEATRE DOOR

Mrs. Walsingham, confronted with the object which Richard had placed before her, recognized that here was one of those critical moments in life in which one has to think quickly, clearly, and decisively, and, keen-witted and hard-headed as she was, she wished heartily that she could put it off. In the few seconds which she permitted herself before she spoke, she saw half a dozen possibilities and eventualities, and she was puzzled and confused by them. Then she suddenly heard Carsdale’s swift step in the ante-room outside, and she became calm and cool-headed again, and knew that she would be able to save the situation. And before Richard had time to notice any hesitation on her part, she had gathered up some papers and risen from her chair.

“Dear boy!” she said. “I really can’t be bothered with that just now—I’m waiting for Carsdale with these papers, and he’s just come in and may be off again in a minute, and I must see him. I shan’t be ready for you for a quarter of an hour—will you wait here?”

“Oh, I’ll wait,” answered Richard, a little surprised at her indifference to ten thousand pound’s worth of diamonds. “I’ll wait.” He picked up the precious package from the blotting-pad and thrust it into his pocket. “Mustn’t leave that lying about,” he said. “It isn’t yours, yet, Sylvie.”

Mrs. Walsingham made no answer. She vanished into the outer office, and Richard heard her voice and Carsdale’s. Then he heard a door slam and knew that they were closeted together. He had learnt that he was never to interrupt these two when they were engaged in business, nor to murmur if he was kept waiting until their conferences were over—sometimes those conferences extended to considerable and vexatious periods. And so, on this occasion, Richard, profiting by past experience, lighted a cigarette, and seating himself in a very easy chair—a recent present from himself to Mrs. Walsingham—proceeded to skim through a pile of French illustrated journals which lay handy.

But Mrs. Walsingham was losing no time. Once within the safe harbour of Carsdale’s private room, with the sound-proof door closed upon Miss Rousby and Griffkin, she turned to its occupant with the look which he knew to signify important business.

“Yes?” said Carsdale, always ready and receptive. “Well?”

“The boy’s here,” she said. “You remember what you said about the—the duplicate? That it would be a good thing to buy it from Burgoyne?”

“Yes, I remember,” he answered. “I remember. So it would.”

“Burgoyne’s offered to sell,” she said. “Ten thousand. That proves that—that he doesn’t know. He thinks he’s selling the real thing.”

“Yes,” said Carsdale. “Yes.”

They remained looking at each other for a full minute.

“The boy’s got the thing with him,” she said suddenly.

Carsdale’s eyebrows arched themselves.

“That’s sure proof that he thinks it’s the genuine article,” he said. “If he’d found out that what he held was a sham, he’d never have parted with that! Unless he was a fool.”

“Well?” she said, after a pause. “What’s best to be done?”

Carsdale took a turn or two about the room, biting the corners of his moustache. Suddenly he turned and threw out his hands.

“Buy it!” he said. “You’ve got ’em both now in your power—real thing and imitation. That makes you safe, don’t you see, Sylvie? Tell the young ’un to buy it, and be done with the matter. Not a soul will ever know, then. That’s better than my scheme of exchanging them. Oh, yes—buy!”

“All right,” she said, and went out without more words. And Richard, surprised at her speedy return, looked up to see a different Mrs. Walsingham to the business-like one who had gone out five minutes earlier with apparently no thought for anything but the papers in her hand.

“Now, child,” she said, when her door—which, like Carsdale’s was sound-proof—was carefully closed, “about this necklace. I suppose you were bad enough to tease Burgoyne into selling them—not that you’ve bought them yet, remember. But weren’t you?”

“Honour bright, no!” replied Richard. “I met him at lunch, and he said, ‘Oh, look here, Dick, I’ve changed my mind, and you can have that necklace; but I won’t take more than ten thousand from you, though the jeweller says the stones are worth twelve.’ Then I told him I wouldn’t buy them without consulting you, and he said, ‘Well, here, show them to Mrs. Walsingham—I dare say she knows a diamond when she sees it—most women do,’ and he gave me the necklace.”

“He meant, ‘some women do,’” murmured Mrs. Walsingham. “Well, it’s a wicked temptation, but—let me see it.”

It was with difficulty that she could restrain her laughter when the imitation necklace emerged from its wrappings and was solemnly handed to her by Richard.

“Put it on!” he urged.

“But it belonged to Maria Louisa—and didn’t she have her head cut off?” said Mrs. Walsingham.

“No—that was Marie Antoinette. Put it on!—I want to see you in it,” he said.

And Mrs. Walsingham put the necklace on, and managed to restrain her inclination to laugh, and she even contrived to look a little—or a good deal—sentimental when she allowed Richard to kiss her in her new bravery.

“Do you really want to give them to me very, very much?” she asked, half-plaintively, half-wonderingly.

“I’m going to give them to you,” declared Richard stoutly. “That settles it, now that I’ve seen them on you.”

“Ah, but you can’t tell the effect in daylight,” she said. “Wait until night.”

She was unusually tender to Richard that evening, and the young gentleman went home to Berkeley Square in a state of high delight. Burgoyne had taken up his quarters with him for a time on Richard’s urgent solicitations; there was abundance of room there, he said, and Kedgin, with the assistance of a younger valet, could look after both. And when Richard entered, Burgoyne was enjoying the end of a quiet hour over a pipe and a novel—on the open page of the novel the youth dropped a once-folded slip of pink paper.

“There you are, old chap!” said Richard. “Prompt cash on delivery, eh? It was awfully good of you, though Burgoyne, not to take more—I don’t know whether it’s a commercially honest transaction.”

Burgoyne looked lazily down at the cheque.

“Oh, ah, thanks,” he said. “So the lady approved the gew-gaws.”

“Looked ripping in ’em,” replied Richard.

Burgoyne yawned.

“Fair women do,” he said. And then added: “And I suppose dark women do, too. In fact, all shades. Well—I’m off to bed, young ’un—hard day to-morrow. Pleasant dreams!”

But once within his bedroom, Burgoyne’s lazy indifference disappeared, and his face grew stern and his eyes hard as he looked down at the cheque which Richard had handed him so debonairly.

“And so, Madam thinks that Fortune has thrown a fine turn in her favour!” he muttered. “All right—but we’ll save that boy from her yet. But—how?”

Towards the further solution of that question he next morning repaired to Chelsea and told Blair of the result of his scheme.

“Though I’m still absolutely in the dark as to what you intend to do next,” he said. “It seems to me—I’ve been thinking it out all the way down—that the lady’s got everything and we’ve got nothing.”

“We want to be quietly and unobtrusively certain as to what the lady really has got,” retorted Blair. “How were you going to make sure that she has your necklace without all the machinery of Scotland Yard and the police and all the wearisome, tedious rest of it? You can’t walk into her flat and search her belongings.”

“Well—how are we going to be certain now?” asked Burgoyne, with something approaching scepticism.

“Wait,” said Blair. “The next step is—you are going to give a little supper-party. You will take a box at some theatre—you will bespeak a private supper-room at—wherever you and Shrewsbury decide. For it is of the very essence of things that your young friend and his inamorata should be there—especially the lady. I also shall be there. That will make four of us—a pleasant number.”

“Well?” said Burgoyne. “That’s all right—I can fix that. What then?”

“Oh, well, I think that’s all at present,” answered Blair, nonchalantly. “Except this little detail, which is perhaps the most important of all: You might hint to Shrewsbury that you would like to see how Mrs. Walsingham looks in the necklace which formerly encircled the fair throat of Maria Louisa. Eh?”

Burgoyne pulled at his moustaches, and looked thoughtfully at his friend.

“I believe I see what you’re getting at,” he said at last. “Um—good idea!” And he went off to waylay Richard and sound him about a theatre.

“Choice of house and supper place to rest with Mrs. Walsingham, of course,” he said gallantly, when he had made known his desire to show hospitality to Richard and his fiancée. “Hope she’ll like to come.”

Mrs. Walsingham, duly informed of Captain Burgoyne’s polite wish to entertain her, was only too well disposed to be gracious to the last degree. She had, as she fondly imagined, just got rid of two affairs which had long caused her uneasiness, and she was disposed to enjoy herself to the full. And so she sent her prettiest thanks to Captain Burgoyne, and having also thanked her stars that she had a new theatre gown which she had never worn, she communicated to Richard the important intelligence that she meant, out of compliment to their host, to wear the famous necklace.

“Yes,” said Richard, who had been astute enough, in spite of his callowness, to wait a little before giving the hint, “yes, that would be a sort of delicate attention, wouldn’t it? And besides, I’d like it.”

So the box in which Mrs. Walsingham and her three cavaliers were seated that night attracted some attention, not merely because of the lady’s good looks, but also because the diamonds at her white throat sparkled like white fire in the glow of the electric lamps. And, of all the men and women there who occasionally looked in her direction, none were so much interested when they did look, as a certain man who sat in a dark but a convenient corner of the pit, and took good care that whatever he knew of the movements of the people on the stage, he kept himself fully conversant with the doings of the people in that particular box.

Ten minutes before the curtain rose on the first act of the drama which Mrs. Walsingham had selected, this man was walking aimlessly along the Strand. He was distinctly of the partially-broken-down order, but his tightly-buttoned tweed jacket was still quite presentable, his linen was clean and fresh, his boots were polished and uncracked. His dark, clean-shaven face bore the signs of a hard life; there were queer seams and wrinkles in it and a sinister, watching look in the gleaming eyes that showed themselves under the rim of a hat which had not originated on this side of the Atlantic. As he strolled along, he seemed to look at nothing—in reality, he was looking at every face he met.

The stroller came to the porticoed door of one of the theatres just as an electric brougham drove up and set down Mrs. Walsingham and her faithful Richard. The lights fell full on the woman’s face, and the strange man saw it for a full second as it moved past him and into the theatre. And with a subtle instinct he drew back, quickly, silently. When he looked again, Richard and his charge had disappeared amidst the blaze of lights within.

The man turned back on his steps and lounged a few yards up the Strand. He thrust his right hand into his trousers pocket and fingered some loose silver that lay there; he put a finger into the pocket of his waistcoat and rubbed the milled edge of a half-sovereign which nestled in solitude in a corner. And, half-doubtfully, and staring at the coloured lights which blazed over the pavement, he went back and approached the uniformed functionary who contemplated patrons and public from the lobby steps.

“What’s it cost to get into this place, anyway?” he asked.

The functionary looked his man up and down and gained an impression of him.

“Gallery one shilling—first turning on the right,” he answered.

“Guess I prefer the ground floor,” said the questioner, calmly.

“Pit—two shillings. First turning to the left,” said the uniform.

The stranger turned without further word, and finding a side-alley, lighted by one miserable lamp, walked up it until he ran into a small knot of people who were struggling to enter an almost indiscernible door, over which a feeble gas-jet threw out the word “Pit.” Within, the house was nearly full; at first he saw no sign of a seat. That concerned him little; he began to wander round the semi-circle at the back of the pit, searching the regions above for as far as he could see them. And suddenly, seated in a box on the dress-circle tier, with three men grouped about her, he saw Mrs. Walsingham. Also, now that she had removed her dainty cloak, he saw the diamonds which glittered round her dainty neck.

“That’s Sylvie, sure!” he said. “Well, that was real luck!”

Then he slid into a favourable seat, near a pillar, which was greatly of use to him when the lights went up. There he stayed all the evening, watchful. But when the final curtain fell, he was quickly outside, and he watched the little party of four emerge, and he followed them across the Strand until they passed into the courtyard of the Hotel Cecil.

CHAPTER XX
MR. CARSDALE IS CONFRONTED

The stranger drew back from the outer boundaries of the vast hotel with a quick, comprehensive glance at its size and splendour. He knew well enough that any one who once passed its portals was safe from such as he, or at any rate from such as his well-worn attire proclaimed him to seem to be. The woman he had been watching with curiosity and speculation during the last three hours was not only secure within those walls, but was lost as completely as if she had been but one amidst a whirl of leaves or a flock of sheep; he was well aware that he had small chance of seeing her again that night. Yet, as long as he dared, he lingered about the entrance to the courtyard, shuffling indeterminate feet, casting irresolute glances, and always wondering and considering in his purposeless mind.

He drew away to the edge of the pavement at last, and stood looking up and down the glaring Strand, busy and bright at that moment as at high noontide. For the second time that night he thrust a hand in one pocket and fingered the loose silver; poked a finger into another and ran his nail along the milled edge of his half-sovereign. He was saying to himself as he went through these mechanical performances that these coins were all he had in the world, and that he was not too certain, nor as a matter of fact, too sanguine, about the very necessary matter of picking up more.

“However, I guess it’ll run to a glass of ale and a crust of bread and cheese,” he suddenly muttered, half-aloud. “If a man knows that he’s going to starve Saturday, that’s no reason why he should fast Friday, so long as he’s got a shilling in his pocket.”

Then he remembered, with a dim remembrance of other days, that down Fleet Street about midnight, there are places where a man can get a good and a satisfying supper at very moderate cost—cheap eating-houses and restaurants frequented by printers and proof-readers and the lesser satellites of the Press. In that direction he moved, hands in pockets, the keen eyes still observing every face that came along in the crowd. And in the quieter stretches which lie between Wellington Street and St. Clement Danes, he suddenly came face to face with John Carsdale, and stopped dead before him in the full glare of a neighbouring lamp.

Carsdale’s nerves were always in good condition, and he himself was proud of the fact that he was rarely surprised, but on this occasion he not only jumped, but he gave voice to the first words that came to his lips.

“Good God! Sydney Werrick!” he exclaimed. “It—it isn’t you?”

The stranger put out a cool and steady hand.

“Sure!” he answered quietly. “How’re you, Jack?”

Carsdale glanced around him as he took the man’s hand. Just then few people were about; those who were, gave no more than a passing glance at the meeting of two men, one of whom, at any rate, was surprised to see the other. His presence of mind came back to him.

“Good Heavens!” he said, with a sharp laugh. “You—you knocked me over a bit. I thought you were dead, Sydney.”

“Who told you I was dead?” asked the other.

“Sandy Kinahan said you were dead,” answered Carsdale.

“Sandy Kinahan is a wicked liar,” said Werrick. “He always was.”

“Well, Sandy Kinahan is dead,” remarked Carsdale, with emphasis. “There’s no doubt about that, because I saw him lying dead in Charing Cross Hospital, there, not so many days ago. He was killed in a motor smash.”

“That saved me from killing him,” said Werrick. “Sandy was a bad man. If he said I was dead, he was playing some trick. But I don’t want to talk about that now. Have you a cigar on you?”

Carsdale drew out a cigar case and offered it.

“You don’t mean to say you’re so down that you can’t buy tobacco?” he said.

Werrick calmly selected a cigar, bit off the end, and began to smoke before he replied to his question.

“I’m not so down that I can’t buy tobacco, nor pay for my supper and my bed,” he replied, “but my capital is strictly limited, and I have to exercise the greatest economy. I had to lay out two shillings to-night in an unforeseen manner.”

“How,” asked Carsdale.

“To have a look at—Sylvie,” replied Werrick, with a direct glance.

Carsdale started.

“After all, it was money well laid out,” murmured Werrick. “Only I hadn’t reckoned to lay it out.”

Carsdale was thinking as fast as he could, and he was not quite sure what he ought to say as the result of his thoughts. What he did say eventually was tame and colourless enough.

“So you’ve seen her?” he said.

“I have. I caught sight of her going into that theatre behind there—the Odalium, isn’t it?—with a young fellow that seemed to be mighty anxious she shouldn’t fall down and break herself,” said Werrick. “Wherefore I spent two good shillings in order to sit in the pit and feast my eyes on her beauty. Also, I feasted on a diamond necklace which she was wearing, and which I reckoned up on pretty carefully. I should say that diamond necklace is worth every penny of eleven thousand pounds. That’s good—Sylvie with all that money on her, and me with about seventeen shillings and sixpence in the world!”

“Well?” said Carsdale.

“Ill, you mean,” said Werrick. “Very ill—for me.”

“Where is Sylvie, now?” asked Carsdale. “I’m certain you know.”

“Well, yes, I do, unless she’s cleared out. She’s in that big hotel, the Cecil, with the young ’un and two swells who look like military men, only one of ’em’s lost a wing,” answered Werrick. “I guess Sylvie’s busy with the champagne and the lobster salad, and to-morrow she’ll have a liver.”

“How did you come over?” asked Carsdale, who had been watching his man narrowly.

“Cattle-boat,” replied Werrick, laconically.

“And where are you going now?” said Carsdale. “Anywhere?”

Werrick flipped away the ash from the end of his cigar.

“Until I met you,” he said, “I was going down Fleet Street to find a cheap and satisfying supper place. Now that I have met you, it depends on you where I’m going.”

“Why on me?” asked Carsdale

“Merely because you’ll tell me where Sylvie is to be found,” answered Werrick, quietly.

Carsdale laughed.

“And suppose I don’t?” he suggested.

“In that case,” replied Werrick, “in that case I shall be sorry—for somebody.”

Carsdale laughed again.

“You’d better come home with me and have some supper,” he said. “I’m tired of standing here.”

“So’m I,” said Werrick. “I thought you liked it. Is your place far?”

“Not in one of these things,” answered Carsdale, and he hailed a passing taxi-cab, and, motioning Werrick to enter, bade the driver go to Jermyn Street. “And when did you strike town, Sydney?” he asked, in friendly fashion. “Not long since, I suppose?”

“Early hours of this afternoon,” answered Werrick. “Two o’clock, maybe.”

“Any object?” continued Carsdale.

“Only to find Sylvie—and you,” answered Werrick. “I reckoned I could do a good deal in that way in twenty-four hours. And so, Sandy Kinahan set forth that I was departed, did he?”

“Sandy Kinahan told Sylvie that you were dead,” answered Carsdale. “Moreover, he said how you died. He said that you were shot in some scrap or other in some mining town—Nevada, or Colorado, or somewhere. Moreover, Sandy Kinahan said that if Sylvie would cable to the sheriff she would get confirmatory news, and she did so, and she got the news, sure enough.”

“Then Sandy Kinahan and the sheriff had put up some game,” said Werrick, slowly. “I was in that place, and Sandy Kinahan was there, too, only he cleared out before I did. And I would like to know what their game was. Also, I would like to know what Sylvie’s game is with the young fellow and the diamonds. But that, of course, you are going to tell me.”

And Carsdale knew that this last assertion was a true one. He had a man by his side with whom it was not safe to trifle, and he rapidly sized the situation up and formed his plans.

“I always take care to be provided in case I come home hungry, and want anything in a hurry,” he said, when he and his unexpected guest had safely reached the Jermyn Street chambers. “Bachelor as I am, I keep larder, and at this moment I have a fine cold pigeon-pie in it, and a cut of ripe old Stilton cheese, which couldn’t be beaten from here to the Mansion House. As to the drinkables, you can open that cupboard, cast your eye over its contents, and select whatever strikes your fancy.”

And in his usual bustling way, Carsdale spread his own table, laid out the supper, and attended to his guest as if he were delighted to see him. The truth was, that he had been quick to recognize the inevitable, and was rapidly making up his mind to make the best of it. And when the two men had eaten, he produced whiskey and cigars, and settled down to business.

“Now, Sydney,” he said, “let’s be frank and business-like. You saw the young fellow with Sylvie to-night?”

“I saw him,” answered Werrick.

“He wants to marry her,” said Carsdale. “And he’s worth—well, a tidy lot.”

“How much?” asked Werrick.

Carsdale knew it was useless to evade or prevaricate.

“A good quarter of a million, anyhow,” he replied.

Werrick examined his cigar with the air of a connoisseur.

“Well, that’s a great pity for Sylvie,” he said. “I’m sorry for her, but I don’t just see how it’s going to be done. Because, as I say, Sandy Kinahan was a wicked liar.”

“She didn’t accept the boy until she’d seen Sandy Kinahan,” remarked Carsdale. “Of course, she believed the cable from the sheriff.”

“Naturally. But he’s a wicked liar, too,” said Werrick. He smoked meditatively for a time, staring hard at the ceiling. “It’s a delicate situation,” he said, at last. “I’m awfully sorry for Sylvie, but I don’t propose to go and make a hole in the Thames or in my own head simply because she wants to marry the boy’s money-bags.”

“I don’t know what’s to be done,” said Carsdale. He began to drum on the table before him. “It’s awkward—awkward!” he murmured.

“Well,” said Werrick, speaking with slow deliberation, “I never yet heard of any situation that couldn’t be turned to somebody’s advantage. I reckon that if this youngster has a quarter of a million there must be something very wrong indeed with you and me and Sylvie if we don’t profit by the fact.”

“I knew you’d want to share,” commented Carsdale, with a chuckle.

“Certainly, I want to share,” said Werrick, with quiet determination. “I reckon, all things considered, that I have a moral right to share.”

Carsdale’s eyes twinkled.

“And supposing you’re taken into partnership, what capital do you propose to invest?” he asked with a grin.

Werrick eyed him sideways over the point of his cigar.

“I guess you know what I can invest,” he said. “It’s something that neither you or Sylvie could ever invest, with all your cleverness.”

“All right, my son, all right,” said Carsdale. “Well, of course, Sylvie must be consulted.”

“Oh, of course, of course!” agreed Werrick. “Didn’t you always find me a reasonable man?”

“I always found you able to keep quiet in tongue and body till the time for action came,” said Carsdale. “Now where are you going to-night? Anywhere? Then why not stop here? There’s a spare room—a more comfortable one than you’d get in any cheap hotel.”

“I’ll accept that offer,” said Werrick.

“Very good,” said Carsdale, rising. He glanced at his watch. “Now, then, I’ve got to go out for an hour or two, midnight though it is. In there you’ll find everything you want. Make yourself at home, Sydney.”

Werrick merely nodded, and Carsdale, picking up his hat and walking-cane, went off without further ceremony. Once in the street, he paused for a second and swore softly to himself; then, knowing he had plenty of time, he set out at a steady pace and walked all the way to Bloomsbury, and to the flats in which Mrs. Walsingham resided. From a convenient vantage point there he watched until he saw Richard Shrewsbury’s motor-car arrive, and he made sure that Mrs. Walsingham entered the mansions alone. He let ten minutes elapse, and then he entered. The night-porter was used to seeing him at all hours, and merely gave him a nod which signified that Mrs. Walsingham had come in. And Carsdale went up quietly and with his mental activities braced by his walk through the cool night.

Mrs. Walsingham opened the door to him herself. She was still in all her theatre finery, save for the diamond necklace. Carsdale laid his finger to his lip, and softly followed her into the dining-room. And it was she who first spoke.

“What is it?” she whispered. “There’s something—I know there is! What is it?”

CHAPTER XXI
A WEAVING OF WEBS

Carsdale looked round him with the stealthy care of a man who fears that even the most unlikely things may shelter an eavesdropper.

“Sophie?” he whispered.

Mrs. Walsingham shook her head.

“Fast asleep,” she said. “It’s all right—there’s no danger. What is it, Jack! I know something’s happened. Not so much because you’re here, but because of—your look. Tell me!”

Carsdale took off his hat and, putting it down, wiped his forehead. Now that he was here, away from his own place, matters looked worse.

“It’s—bad,” he went on, in the same low tones. “You remember what Sandy Kinahan told you?”

He was watching her keenly, and he saw her suddenly put her hands behind her and grasp the edge of the table against which she had backed when they entered the room, and he knew from the whitening of the knuckles that she was gripping it hard. And then she whitened to the lips.

“Take it easy, now,” said Carsdale. “You’ve got to know. What Sandy Kinahan told you wasn’t—true.”

She tried to swallow once or twice, and then to speak; and Carsdale went over to the sideboard, quickly mixed her a drink, and forced it on her.

“You mean—he isn’t dead!” she whispered.

“He’s not dead,” answered Carsdale, with a cynical laugh. “It was all a plant of Kinahan’s and somebody else’s, for some reason. No, Master Sydney is very much alive!”

She stood staring at him with dilated eyes and parting lips.

“He’s—here?” she said.

“He’s here,” replied Carsdale.

“In—London?” she whispered.

Carsdale made a grimace.

“To tell you the truth, my girl,” he said, “he’s at my rooms, and he’s either enjoying himself with my whiskey—though he’s too fond of keeping his wits to touch much of that—or he’s safe between the sheets. That’s where Syd Werrick is!”

She threw up her head with a gesture of despair and dropped into the nearest seat.

“My God!” she muttered. “What’s to be done?”

“Heaven knows!” answered Carsdale. “I don’t.”

“Where on earth did you find him?” she asked.

“Find him! We met—met in the Strand. He hailed me, cool as a cucumber,” said Carsdale. “And he’d just come from seeing—you.”

“Seeing—me!” she exclaimed.

“He happened to catch sight of you and the boy going into the Odalium, and so he bought a pit ticket and feasted his eyes on you and the necklace,” answered Carsdale grimly. “And, naturally, when you left the theatre he watched you over the road to the Cecil. You know Master Syd’s tricks.”

Mrs. Walsingham had taken a filmy handkerchief from her bosom and was twisting and untwisting it in her jewelled fingers—it was suddenly torn violently in two as if by mere will-power. And Carsdale laughed.

“It’s no good, Sylvie,” he said. “The thing is, to keep calm and cool. Sydney’s a rock that you’re up against—I, too, perhaps. According to the law of this blessed land, he’s your husband, and he’s done nothing that you can rid yourself of him for. That’s flat. Now that he’s back, the best thing is to make the best of a bad job, and see what we can do. One thing’s certain—if your lord and master is to be kept quiet, we shall have to take him into partnership.”

“Partnership!” she exclaimed.

Carsdale sat down and tapped her knee.

“You must see,” he said, quietly, “you must see that the serious affair with the boy is off—off, as far away as Cape Horn! You can’t commit bigamy. All that we can do now is to make as much as we can out of him. And—unpleasant as it is—Sydney Werrick will have to come in at it.”

She sat staring at him in silence for a full minute; then, with a low, harsh laugh she rose, and, going over to the sideboard, mixed herself another drink.

“Play light,” said Carsdale, warningly.

“Give me a cigarette,” she said, coming back to her seat. “Thank you. Now, then—what do you propose?”

Carsdale again looked cautiously and suspiciously around the room.

“You’re sure that girl is really asleep—and safe?” he whispered.

Mrs. Walsingham made an impatient gesture.

“Certain!” she answered. “Never mind her. Get to business.”

Carsdale fingered his moustache for a minute or two, staring fixedly at an exact point of the ceiling.

“Well,” he said at last, “well, if we’ve got down to plain and brutal fact, I think we both know what we intended about the young ’un when that letter to Barclay Leverton fell into our hands. Things ran well for us, Sylvie—especially when Sandy Kinahan brought that news which wasn’t true. As they ran, you were going to get your share through marriage—and an excellent way it would have been, and would have saved an awful lot of trouble. But now that Sydney’s turned up, that’s all off—it’s impossible, it’s quite——”

“Couldn’t Sydney be bought out and packed off for good?” she suggested.

Carsdale shook his head with unmistakable dissent.

“That’s still more impossible,” he replied. “You’d never know when he’d come back. No—it’s off—off! And so—well, we must reap our harvest in another way. Fortunately, we’ve so engineered things that it won’t be very difficult to reap. And, if you want to know the truth, I shan’t be sorry to make a new development. Things are not good.”

She looked at him quickly.

“You mean—you want to get out?” she asked.

“Something very like it,” he admitted. “The young ’un’s coming was a godsend, and, if we only play our cards properly, we can start in fresh fields and new pastures to big advantage. But don’t forget this—Syd Werrick will have to be in at it.”

Mrs. Walsingham made no immediate reply. She sat smoking cigarette after cigarette, tapping her slippered feet impatiently on the hearthrug, her eyes sombre with thought.

“What’s gone wrong with you?” she suddenly demanded.

Carsdale shrugged his shoulders.

“It’s not that anything has gone absolutely wrong,” he said. “It’s simply that nothing seems doing or coming along. And if you want to know, it’s my belief that that young vixen, Frances Leverton, has her knife into me, and is somehow, but I don’t know how, doing me harm. I couldn’t put my finger on any precise spot—but I’ve an uneasy feeling that she’s up to no good.”

“Could she do anything?” asked Mrs. Walsingham.

“Well,” replied Carsdale, stirring a little uneasily in his seat, “there is one affair, if only she was cute enough to understand the papers which she’d doubtless find in her father’s effects. It may be that.”

“She’s cute enough for anything,” remarked Mrs. Walsingham. She reflected a little, and then turned to him with an odd look. “I—I’ve been made rather uneasy to-night,” she said.

“Where? At the theatre?” he asked. “The supper-party?”

“It may be all nothing, but I was uneasy,” she answered. “You know I put on the—the real necklace. I saw no danger in that, now that I’ve got both. Well, Burgoyne had a friend there—another Army man, a Captain Blair, but retired, because he’s lost an arm.”

“Blair—ex-Army man—lost an arm?” said Carsdale, musingly. “Seems to me I know something about that man. Describe him.”

“A tall, well-built, handsome man, with very remarkable eyes, who seems as if he were looking clean through you and turning you inside out,” answered Mrs. Walsingham. “He made me uneasy and uncomfortable.”

“I know him,” said Carsdale. “He’s a writing fellow. Well?”

“Well, when we went to supper at the Cecil,” continued Mrs. Walsingham, “the talk somehow got on to the necklace, and, of course, the boy was full of the Maria Louisa legend, or whatever it is. Then this Captain Blair asked to be allowed to look at the necklace because of its historic interest, and I had to take it off—we were in a private room, you know—and let him examine it. And that was where I got uneasy.”

“Why?” asked Carsdale. “It was probably only curiosity.”

Mrs. Walsingham shook her head.

“No!” she said. “I don’t think so. He examined that necklace in a way that showed me he was an expert in diamonds. He was a little bit too careful about it. Now—why?”

Carsdale manifested signs of impatience.

“Oh, I don’t see anything in that, Sylvie!” he said. “You’ve got fidgety and suspicious because of all the recent circumstances. I don’t suppose the man had any ulterior design—what ulterior design could he have? Now I come to think of it, this Captain Blair, after he left the Army, took to writing, and I remember—I was trying to recall it while you talked—he did write a series of articles or something about the precious stones, in one of those collectors’ journals. He was probably examining the thing as a connoisseur—that’s all. By the by, where is the necklace?”

“Here, of course—locked up in my safe,” she answered. “I shall bring it to the office to-morrow.”

“Better take it to your bank,” said Carsdale. “At any rate, don’t leave it here. However much you may trust that maid of yours, I shouldn’t trust her to the extent of diamonds worth twelve thousand. Now then—as to what we are going to do. There are two persons to think of first—Sydney and this boy Shrewsbury.”

“Well?” she said with a sigh. “What of them?”

“Let’s get a clear notion,” said Carsdale. “Now, first as to Syd Werrick. There will be no trouble with him, Sylvie, so long as he’s kept in clover. I’ll take care that he gives you no trouble. He can put up with me, down there in Jermyn Street. He shall have as much money as he likes—in reason—and he shall enjoy himself. He’ll be made to understand that he’s to behave himself in every way. I expect there’ll have to be a talk between the three of us——”

“I don’t want to see him—I won’t see him!” broke in Mrs. Walsingham. “At any rate, not yet.”

“Certainly not yet,” said Carsdale, soothingly. “Leave it to me—I can manage him. It’s very fortunate that there’s nothing against the young gentleman on this side, so he’ll be able to go around town and amuse himself, and do what he likes with his liberty——”

“Yes, and then he’ll some day get too much to drink, and then he’ll turn ugly, and then—oh, then, I know!” she said.

“He doesn’t look as if he’d been at that game lately, anyway,” said Carsdale, thoughtfully. “He looks as hard and fit as a man of his age should be, and his eyes are as clear as a child’s, and——”

Mrs. Walsingham suddenly laid a hand on her companion’s arm.

“Jack!” she said in a tense whisper. “Don’t you ever forget this: Syd will never forgive you and me because we cleared out and left him to face the music in New York. He may play that he’s forgotten and forgiven, but he hasn’t and he won’t. Oh, don’t I know him! You’re too easy-going; too optimistic.”

“Oh, I think he’ll be all right if he’s decently treated now,” said Carsdale, hopefully. “I say—leave him to me. Now, as to the other.”

Mrs. Walsingham shook her head; it was evident that she had small belief in Carsdale’s anticipations.

“Well—go on,” she said.

“As to the young ’un,” continued Carsdale, in a lower voice, and again looking about him as if he mistrusted the very walls, “you’ll see how beautifully my policy will work out. He’s a complete belief in me, and he’ll trust me to the last extent. The thing to do is to gradually get his securities into my absolute control, and then——”

“Then you’ll do what you like with them!” she said, with an ironic laugh. “And what am I to do in the meantime?”

“Keep the game going,” answered Carsdale. “Keep the game going. I’ll be answerable for your husband while it’s being played.”

“I wish my husband had gone to the bottom of the Atlantic!” she said, clenching her hand. “I wish what Sandy Kinahan said had been true!”

Carsdale laughed, rose, and picked up his hat.

“So do I!” he said. “Heartily—heartily! But—it isn’t true. The young gentleman is here. That, my dear Sylvie, is a fact. Fact, remember!”

Then he left her, and finding a belated taxi-cab near the mansions, chartered it and drove home to Jermyn Street, thinking hard all the way. And his chief thought was that, if he hadn’t a sentimental feeling for Sylvie he would quickly feather his own nest and clear clean out.

Carsdale’s sitting-room was tenantless. He picked up the whiskey decanter, and gave it a quick look. He had eyed it before he left, and he knew that Werrick had drunk no more after his departure. And he shook his head solemnly and meaningly.

“That argues mischief!” he said to himself. “He means to keep a cool head. And when Sydney Werrick’s head is cool, the devil himself wouldn’t be a match for him!”

CHAPTER XXII
A COUNCIL OF WAR

Captain Burgoyne went away from his little supper-party with feelings which yielded him anything but pleasure. Blair’s third notion, as he called it, had worked out—just as Blair had believed it would work out. There was now no doubt whatever as to the actual thief of the diamond necklace—Mrs. Walsingham had fallen into the trap so cunningly set for her as easily and completely as her worst enemy could have wished. She had become possessed of the paste imitation; she had worn the real article. And this was the woman to whom young Dick, generous, impetuous, unsuspecting, woefully ignorant of the world and its wickedness, had plighted himself in the most serious obligation which life knows! It was dreadful, it was unspeakable, it was—Burgoyne could find no words in which to express what he felt.

“But, by God, it must not and shall not be!” he said, half-aloud, as he tramped steadily up St. James’s Street, having walked homewards to cool his head and to think. “The youngster shall be got out of the hands of that woman and that man if I spend my last penny in effecting his release. But—how’s it to be done?”

That question was still agitating his mind when he, Blair, and Frances Leverton met next morning at the flat in Acacia Mansions. He listened in silence while Blair gave Frances a crisp and clear account of the happenings of the previous evening—how that Mrs. Walsingham had appeared at the theatre in a necklace; how that at supper she had been induced to take it off and to let him examine it as a historical curiosity; how that he, an expert in precious stones, had known at once that it was formed of genuine and valuable diamonds. The case, said Blair, was plain as plain could be: the real necklace had been in her possession when Richard Shrewsbury bought the imitation one, and, having both at her command, she had appeared in the real one, and had, all unconsciously, proclaimed her guilt to Burgoyne and himself.

“And the whole question now, Ralph,” concluded Blair, turning from Frances to Burgoyne, “is—what are you going to do?”

“Save the boy!” snapped out Burgoyne. “Save the boy!”

“Just so,” agreed Blair. “That’s the end in view, but what about the means? You can prosecute this woman if you choose—it will make a fine and an interesting story to tell in a criminal court. The ins and outs may seem a little involved and intricate, but that will add to the fascination, and give the newspapers some excellent copy. But—your young friend is so impulsive, and so quixotic, and so generous of heart, and the woman evidently has so much power over him that the probability is that at the first note of danger she would turn to him, claim his protection, and force him into an immediate marriage. And that is what you want to prevent at all costs.”

“Of course!” said Burgoyne. “All that I want is to save the boy. Hang the necklace, and hang prosecuting the woman!—though I think she ought to be put out of the way of doing these things. What I want is to get that youngster out of the clutches of those two. Isn’t—isn’t there some way by which we could do it quietly, but very thoroughly?”

Blair looked at Frances, who had been listening to everything with quiet but concentrated attention.

“Well,” he said. “We’ve certainly got a hold on the woman. We’re in this position—we can go to her and say, ‘Now, my good lady, we know and we can prove who stole Captain Burgoyne’s necklace from the late Mr. Leverton’s safe—you did! Unless you agree to drop Mr. Richard Shrewsbury, we shall call in the police.’ That much we can do as regards her—what attention she would give to our threat I don’t know. I think she might show fight, or, at any rate, want to bargain. But as regards Carsdale, which case is, in certain respects, the more serious of the two, seeing that he has full command of the youngster’s money, the matter is different. We—that is, you and I, Burgoyne—know nothing against Carsdale to give us any hold on him. Now, if Miss Leverton, as I shrewdly suspect, has anything against him, has any hold on him——”

He paused and looked narrowly at Frances. And Frances turned away and looked out of the window by her desk.

“If it is really necessary,” she said after a pause of silence, “if it is really necessary to do something to—to save Mr. Shrewsbury, I have, or I could have, a hold on Carsdale. I did not mention it to you before, but I have been slowly going through my father’s papers, and at last, with some difficulty, I have found out—something. Something that is—well, quite sufficient. He robbed my father.”

Blair uttered a sharp exclamation.

“Ah! You have proof of that?” he said.

“So much proof,” replied Frances, “that Mr. Winch has advised me to prosecute him.”

“Mr. Winch knows all the facts?” asked Blair.

“He has known them since yesterday afternoon,” Frances answered. “I was not certain of them myself until yesterday morning—as soon as I was certain, I consulted Mr. Winch, who, it seems, had had some notion of the truth.”

“And you have decided upon—what?” said Blair.

Frances shook her head.

“Upon—nothing,” she replied. “Nothing—until I had seen you. And—if I am to be frank with you—my own personal feeling is that if I alone were concerned, I should do nothing. If you really want to know, I do not wish to have my father’s name brought up. He is dead, and it would do no good to prosecute Carsdale, and—if it were left to me—I should let the whole matter drop. But——”

She paused, and the two men, watching her narrowly, saw that she felt more than an ordinary diffidence in saying what was in her mind.

“I think we know what you mean, Miss Leverton,” said Blair. “Isn’t it that if your hold over Carsdale could be potential in saving Mr. Shrewsbury from him you wouldn’t feel justified in refusing to let him know positively that you have that hold?”

Burgoyne suddenly started into voice and activity.

“Yes, but look here, Blair, Miss Leverton can’t go and say to this fellow, ‘Give up interfering with young Shrewsbury, or I’ll hand you over to the police!’” he said. “Of course she can’t. The thing’s impossible. He’d say at once, ‘What concern is it of yours?’ No, no—that won’t do.”

Frances thanked him with a look for putting her own thoughts into words. But Blair smiled quietly.

“My dear Ralph,” he said. “I hadn’t the slightest intention of asking Miss Leverton to go to Carsdale in order to deliver any such ultimatum. You have got to remember that, up to now, so far as we know, so far as we believe, Carsdale’s relations with your young friend are strictly sound and honourable, though we have a firm conviction that they will not continue to be so. No—I was not thinking of asking Miss Leverton to do any such thing. But there is a person who might put matters to Carsdale plainly and unmistakably.”

“Who’s that?” asked Burgoyne, uneasily. “You don’t mean myself?”

“Not I!” laughed Blair. “I mean Mr. Winch. Mr. Winch is a solicitor, Mr. Winch is a co-executor under the will of the late Mr. Barclay Leverton. Mr. Winch, in going into the affairs of the late Mr. Leverton, has discovered that Mr. Leverton was defrauded by Carsdale—am I justified in saying that?” he added, turning to Frances.

“Mr. Winch called it fraud,” she answered. “Yes—fraud.”

“Very good,” said Blair. “Then Mr. Winch is in a position—the strongest possible position—to go to Carsdale and say, ‘I find, on the clearest proof, that you have defrauded the estate which I am administering. You are liable to serious punishment. I give you the alternative. You must make restitution; you must admit your guilt in writing; you must cease to act for young Mr. Shrewsbury, whose business you acquired by wrongly appropriating a letter which was intended for my late client and should have been given to his legal representatives. Unless you do this I shall hand you over to the police!’ Nothing could be clearer. The immediate point is—will Mr. Winch consent to do this?”

“Yes,” replied Frances. “Mr. Winch will consent, if I put the whole matter before him. And he will do it thoroughly, too.”

“Good!” said Blair. “Then that disposes of Carsdale. Now for the woman, Mrs. Walsingham.”

Burgoyne groaned and looked down at his toes, and Blair smiled at Frances. “Mrs. Walsingham,” he repeated. “Don’t be afraid, Ralph. I was about to remark that I will see Mrs. Walsingham myself.”

Burgoyne sat erect, staring his surprise.

“You don’t mean it!” he exclaimed.

“I mean it, quite seriously,” answered Blair. “I will see her, and talk to her, and when I have finished I think she may have something to say to me which may be interesting. But there is one thing that must be done—must!—before Mr. Winch sees Carsdale and I see Mrs. Walsingham.”

Burgoyne and Frances looked their interrogation.

“Shrewsbury must be got out of the way for a few days,” continued Blair. “That’s absolutely necessary. And you, Burgoyne, must manage it.”

“And perhaps you’ll tell me how to manage it!” said Burgoyne, a little irritably. “From what I’ve seen of affairs, it’s very evident to me that the youngster runs to either Carsdale or this woman on even the smallest matters. Besides, I haven’t even the smallest excuse for taking him away for a few days.”

“Surely you can make one,” said Blair, laughing. “Come—isn’t there some part of the country in which you were deeply interested as a boy and would like to see again and don’t want to visit all by yourself? Your old home—your old school—anything, anywhere will do.”

“And that shows how little you appreciate the state of things,” said Burgoyne with a grim smile. “If I so much as mentioned the matter, I know what he’d do. He’d immediately be for making a motor trip of it, and for taking the woman along. He’d be sure to say, ‘Bring your friend, Captain Blair, and we’ll have a grand old time!’ No, that won’t do, Gavin—you’ll have to think of something better than that.”

“Get him to run over to Paris with you for a few days,” suggested Blair. “He’s never been there, and it might appeal to him.”

“And I say to that,” answered Burgoyne, “that just the same objection applies. He would be for making a party. If I were dead, or dying, or lying in a ditch with a broken limb, he’d come anywhere like a shot, but——”

“Then you must go somewhere and have a fictitious accident,” said Blair. “That boy must be away at the time of these interviews. You must go across to France, invent something, and get him over. You must!”

Burgoyne knitted his brows and frowned, and for a moment appeared to be thinking hard. At last he looked up and slowly gazed from one to the other of the two faces before him.

“I won’t!” he said stoutly. “But I’ll tell you what I will do. I’ll go over to Paris whenever you like, and I’ll send the boy a message that will bring him there—alone—without inventing any fibs. And—if you two think it wise—I’ll then take upon myself to tell him the plain truth about this woman. The proof you can give him when we come back. I’ll do that, and, by Gad, he’ll believe me! Now, what do you say to that? That seems to me the straight thing to do.”

Frances nodded her complete assent with a readiness which did not escape Blair’s watchful eyes. And Burgoyne suddenly spoke again.

“It won’t be an easy job, Gavin,” he said. “I’d rather do—well, most of the things I have done, than do it. But it seems to me the straight thing to do. I hate to have to do it—he’ll take it hard, sir!”

“I don’t know,” remarked Blair, quietly. “I don’t know.”

Burgoyne stared at him.

“You don’t know?” he said. “Why, he’s infatuated——”

“Better say bewitched, and have done with it,” said Blair. “My own impression is that, in his quieter moments, the lad’s regretting what he’s done, and——”

Frances rose and began to shuffle her papers, bending her head over them.

“Is there anything else that you gentleman require me for?” she asked. “Remember—I’m a business woman, and I’ve all my morning’s work before me.”

Blair was quick to appreciate a situation; he saw that the girl had no desire to have Richard Shrewsbury’s feelings for Mrs. Walsingham discussed before her. And so, in a few words, the interview was brought to an end and an understanding arrived at. Burgoyne was to go across to Paris and get Richard over; on the day of his arrival there Mr. Winch was to see Carsdale and Blair was to call on Mrs. Walsingham; the result of those visits was to be wired to Burgoyne.

“And then we shall see—what we shall see,” said Blair, as he and Burgoyne parted, a little later. “But—we shall save him.”

Burgoyne turned into Richard’s rooms feeling sick at heart about the whole sordid business. And there Kedgin presented him with a sealed note, which, on opening, he found to be from Mr. Levanter, of Bond Street. And Mr. Levanter presented his compliments, and if Captain Burgoyne would do him the honour to call, Mr. Levanter had news to communicate which he believed would interest Captain Burgoyne greatly.

CHAPTER XXIII
THE EVE OF THE BATTLE

Mr. Levanter, receiving Captain Burgoyne in his elegant front shop in full view of assistants and customers, was a bland, suave, and polite gentleman; Mr. Levanter, closeted with Captain Burgoyne in his private sanctum at the rear of the establishment, became a man of deep mystery. Burgoyne saw at once that the jeweller was burning to communicate some news which he believed to be of importance, and he waited calmly to hear it.

“Take a seat, Captain,” said Mr. Levanter, cordially polite. “I—the fact is, I have something to tell you which I think you will like to hear. I would have stepped round to you myself, but I was not sure that I should find you alone, you understand, and so——”

“Quite right,” said Burgoyne. “What is it, Mr. Levanter?”

Mr. Levanter hummed and hawed two or three times, and went through the pantomimic gestures which are invariably indulged in by persons who desire to make communications that in their opinion are tinged with mystery. He smiled on his visitor.

“The fact is, Captain,” he said, “I was at the Odalium Theatre last night.”

“So was I,” said Burgoyne bluntly.

“Yes,” said Mr. Levanter. “Yes. In fact I saw you. Hem!—I also noticed your friends, Captain.”

“Well?” said Burgoyne.

“Yes,” continued Mr. Levanter. “Yes. Hem!—this is a difficult and delicate matter, Captain. Er—may I ask if the—the lady in whose company you were is a very personal friend of yours?”

“You may,” answered Burgoyne. “You may ask me anything you like. She is not.”

“A—mere acquaintance, shall we say?” suggested Mr. Levanter.

“About that,” said Burgoyne. “Why?”

Mr. Levanter rubbed his hands together.

“That makes matters much more simple,” he said. “I may say anything I like?”

“Anything,” replied Burgoyne.

“Very well,” said Mr. Levanter. “Er—I observed that the lady was wearing the necklace, Captain.”

“You observed that the lady was wearing a necklace,” said Burgoyne.

Mr. Levanter started.

“Ah!” he said. “Just so. A necklace? Yes. Now, Captain, was that the necklace—the imitation one which you brought here, you know—or was it the—real one?”

Burgoyne gave Mr. Levanter an inquiring look. Mr. Levanter smiled again, and again rubbed his hands.

“You’ve got something to tell me about—that?” said Burgoyne. “I see. Well, now, did you observe a gentleman who was with me in that box last night?—a gentleman who has lost his left arm?”

“I did, sir, and I know him,” answered Mr. Levanter. “Captain Blair. He is an occasional customer of mine.”

“Very good,” said Burgoyne. “Now, Mr. Levanter, I have given you a great deal of my confidence and I am going to give you more. The real reason why my friend Captain Blair and I were at the Odalium last night with young Mr. Shrewsbury and that lady was that——”

Mr. Levanter suddenly put up a hand.

“Pardon a moment, Captain,” he said. “I ought to say that I know the lady, Mrs. Walsingham. She has been here often with Mr. Shrewsbury.”

“Then that simplifies matters,” said Burgoyne. “I was going to say that Captain Blair and I were where we were because of the necklace. The fact is that Captain Blair is helping me to investigate matters. And if you have anything to tell me I should like Captain Blair to hear it. He is at his club in Dover Street at this moment, and if you have no objection I’ll fetch him.”

“No objection whatever, Captain,” said Mr. Levanter. “Not at all, sir. I shall be at your disposal as soon as you return.”

The friendliness of the jeweller’s intentions was evidenced by the fact that when Burgoyne and Blair came back together he had set out on the table in his private room a decanter of sherry and a box of cigars, and that he pressed hospitality upon his visitors in a fashion which could not well be refused.

“Allow me to offer you a glass of wine, gentlemen,” said Mr. Levanter. “I believe you would find it hard to improve upon this sherry in the town. And these cigars are as good, but if you prefer cigarettes, gentlemen, here is an excellent brand. When one has a little confidential talk in view, gentlemen, it is as well to be comfortable.”

“And what is it that you have to talk to us about, Mr. Levanter?” asked Blair when they had settled down behind a door which looked to be as safe and sound-proof as the door of a Bank of England vault. “Captain Burgoyne has told me what you have already told him.”

Mr. Levanter looked approvingly at the smoke which curled from his cigar.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, “it’s a rather curious story, and in my opinion it throws a sidelight on the question of the diamond necklace which belongs to Captain Burgoyne, about which, Captain Blair, I understand you know all that I do?”

“Yes,” answered Blair. “I do.”

“Well, gentlemen,” continued Mr. Levanter, “it so happened that last night I went to the Odalium Theatre with a friend of mine. I am not going to tell you his name, but he is a well-known jeweller, who is also a pawnbroker. The reason why we went to the theatre was that he and I had just done a very pretty little bit of business together, so we decided to have an evening at the play, and a little supper afterwards. We went to the Odalium because it was musical comedy—my friend loves musical comedy. We sat in the dress-circle—rather far back, for the seats were nearly all taken when we got to the theatre. And we saw you, and Mr. Shrewsbury, and Mrs. Walsingham. And, of course, I noticed that Mrs. Walsingham was wearing the necklace.”

“A necklace, Mr. Levanter,” said Burgoyne.

“I beg your pardon, sir—a necklace,” said Mr. Levanter. “Well, of course, knowing all that I do, I wondered a bit about this. After a time, my friend drew my attention to your box. ‘You see the woman there with the diamond necklace, my boy?’ he said. ‘Yes,’ said I. ‘Wait till we’re having our bit of supper,’ said he, ‘and I’ll tell you something about that necklace and her, too,’ he said. Eh, gentlemen?”

Burgoyne and Blair exchanged looks, and Mr. Levanter, greatly enjoying his rôle of story-teller, proceeded.

“You will easily understand, gentlemen,” he said, “that I naturally pricked up my ears at that, especially as I saw that my friend—whose name, as I say, I can’t give, though I may as well tell you that it is to be given, if absolutely necessary, which depends, I take it, entirely on you, Captain Burgoyne—as I saw, I say, that my friend was a good deal—well, interested in seeing the lady and the necklace on full show, as it were. However, I never believe in asking a man to tell anything until he’s ready to tell it, so I said nothing. I noticed, however, that at frequent intervals during the evening my friend’s eyes were turned on your box, gentlemen, and that whenever he looked that way, he sighed deeply.”

“We had no idea that we were attracting so much attention, I am sure, Mr. Levanter,” observed Blair. “But I interrupt you—pray proceed.”

“Not at all, sir,” said Mr. Levanter, politely. “Well gentlemen, in due course my friend and I went to have our bit of supper, and as we had had a profitable deal during the day, we treated ourselves to champagne. And after a glass or two, my friend’s spirits seemed to rise. ‘You sighed a good deal in the theatre,’ I said to him. ‘Especially when you looked at the lady with the necklace.’ ‘Ah, my boy,’ said he, ‘so would you have sighed if you knew all that I do! I had that necklace in pledge, my boy,’ he said, ‘for nigh on two years, and I was always hoping that it would eventually drop into my hands, my boy, but it never did. And it’s worth, my boy, it’s worth every penny of twelve thousand of the best, my boy, it is, indeed!’ he said. And then he fell to sighing again.”

Here Mr. Levanter begged permission to refill the gentlemen’s glasses, and incidentally refilled his own.

“Well, gentlemen,” he continued, “the whole story then came out. It appears that about two years ago—rather more than two years ago, to be exact—this Mrs. Walsingham visited my friend, who is, as I told you, but had better remind you again, a jeweller who is also a pawnbroker in a first-class line of business, and told him she wanted to pledge a diamond necklace, which she there and then produced, and which he declares to be the one she was wearing at the Odalium last night. He at once saw that the necklace was of great value; as he observed to me over the supper-table, he valued it at not less than twelve thousand pounds, and he is a knowing man and an expert. Greatly to his surprise, when he asked her how much she wished to borrow on it, she replied that she wanted a thousand pounds, and——”

“Only a thousand!” exclaimed Blair.

“Only a thousand pounds, sir,” replied Mr. Levanter. “And she wanted a special contract, on the terms of which she was to pay the interest every six months. The transaction was put through on those terms, and when it was completed, my friend, who, I must tell you, gentlemen, is fond of a bargain, began to sound her as to buying the necklace. Of course, she wouldn’t hear of it, and she took her thousand pounds and went away. When she came again, six months later, to pay her interest, he sounded her again, but with no result. The same thing happened at six-monthly intervals. Finally, when the necklace had been in his hands two years, and she came to pay the fourth six-months’ interest, my friend made a determined attempt to buy from her—he offered her a big sum.”

“How much?” asked Blair.

Mr. Levanter smiled and shook his head.

“That, sir, he did not tell me,” he answered. “But I gathered that it was a good deal. However, she would not listen to him then, but he confided to me that at that time he certainly had hopes of getting her to sell it to him for seven or eight thousand—he knew, if she did, that he could get ten thousand for it at once.”

“A nice profit!” said Burgoyne.

“A very pretty profit, sir,” assented Mr. Levanter, calmly. “But while he was still anticipating this, the lady turned up one morning—it is only a few days ago that this happened—and said that she had come to redeem her pledge. You may imagine, gentlemen, how deeply concerned my friend was to hear this! He had never given up hope of being able to persuade the lady to sell, and he gave me to understand last night that he was so anxious to acquire the necklace that he actually increased his offer until it reached a sum which would only have left him a nominal profit—say fifteen hundred pounds.”

“And yet without result,” observed Blair, drily.

“Without result, sir!” said Mr. Levanter. “Imagine a lady—ladies never have much ready money—refusing eight thousand five hundred pounds in solid cash! However, this lady would listen to nothing: she paid the thousand pounds and what trifle of interest there was, and carried her necklace off. And my friend assured me, gentlemen, that he felt the transaction almost as much as if he’d lost a favourite child!”

“I should think so,” remarked Blair. “Yes, I should think so.” He glanced at Burgoyne, who was staring fixedly at the jeweller, and then turned to Mr. Levanter again. “Well, this is a very interesting story, Mr. Levanter,” he said. “How does it seem to you?”

Mr. Levanter smiled slyly.

“Well, sir,” he said, “I should just like to ask Captain Burgoyne—or you, for you know all about it—a plain question. Was that necklace which Mrs. Walsingham was wearing at the theatre last night the real genuine article which Captain Burgoyne lost, or was it the imitation one which he brought to me?”

Burgoyne answered promptly—“The real one!”

Mr. Levanter rose, still smiling.

“Then, gentlemen, I think you know who annexed the real one when it was—annexed,” he said. “There’s no need to say more.”

“Except that for the present the secrecy between us must remain,” said Blair. “You quite understand that, Mr. Levanter.”

Mr. Levanter answered with many smiles and reassuring nods that he understood, and presently the two friends went away and walked up Bond Street together.

“Now, Ralph,” said Blair. “You must be off to Paris at once. There’s no use in delaying this affair. Get off this afternoon. Do nothing to-morrow, except to wire for the youngster. Wire me as soon as he arrives. Tell him what you’ve got to tell him the day after his arrival. While you’re tackling him, Winch shall tackle Carsdale, and I’ll tackle the woman. I shan’t see you again. Where will you stay?”

“Bristol,” answered Burgoyne, laconically.

“Very well,” said Blair. “Now, be off. Remember, this is the eve of battle.”

“I wish it were against honest enemies!” said Burgoyne. And he strode away, growling.

CHAPTER XXIV
MISS GUYNER INTERVENES

Carsdale, interviewing his guest over the breakfast table on the morning following their chance meeting in the Strand, found Mr. Sydney Werrick extraordinarily amenable to reason. It appeared that at that moment he wanted nothing that was out of the way, beyond the immediate advancing of a sum of money which would re-attire his person in garments suited to his new environment, and leave something over to jingle in his pockets. He had no desire to interfere with Carsdale or with Mrs. Walsingham just then; let them play whatever game they were after, so long as they remembered him in connection with it.

“I may want you to take a hand in it,” said Carsdale. “It’s very probable I shall want you. But you shan’t be left, Sydney.”

“I don’t propose to be left,” remarked Mr. Werrick, helping himself to another of the excellent lamb cutlets, which adorned Carsdale’s breakfast table. “I didn’t come across to be left.”

Carsdale took no notice of this quiet intimation. He drew out a pocket-book. It was a characteristic of his that he always carried a considerable amount of money about him in cash. He began to count some bank-notes, and finally tossed a wad of them over to Werrick.

“You’ll want some money to be going on with, Sydney,” he observed. “There’s a hundred.”

Werrick cast a careless glance at the present.

“Pounds or dollars?” he asked lazily.

“Pounds, of course!” answered Carsdale. “You want a new fit-out. Do you know where you can get what you need, ready for wear?”

“If I don’t, I’ll soon find the place,” said Werrick, picking up and pocketing the notes. “All right. Then—you don’t want me for anything, just yet, at all events?”

“No,” replied Carsdale. “What I want you to do is to keep quiet. You’re not to bother Sylvie, you understand. You’re to abstain from any interference. I’ll see you’re all right at the proper moment. You can look round the town, and you can put up here. Of course, you don’t know where my office is?”

“That,” answered Werrick, “is just what I was going to find out—if you had one—this very morning.”

“Well, there’ll be no necessity,” said Carsdale. “My office is in Abbotsbury House, Norfolk Street, Strand. And, you’re not to come there, remember. What transactions you and I have can be done here. But if you ever want to ring me up, you can do so. There’s the telephone number.”

Werrick took the letter-heading which Carsdale threw him and put it in his waistcoat pocket with a nod. And Carsdale presently went off to business, leaving his guest alone, with an intimation to him to take care of himself. Werrick lighted a cigar, put his feet on a chair, and read the newspaper. The woman who attended to Carsdale’s rooms appeared, removed the breakfast things, made the beds, tidied and dusted, and removed her presence. Werrick was alone, with a hundred pounds in his pocket, and the day before him. He smiled grimly as he turned over to the sporting page, and he informed himself, rolling the thought over in his mind as if he extracted much pleasure from its intellectual stimulus, that there was nothing in this life so certain as the unexpected.

Werrick was still considering this thought when a gentle, but decisive knock sounded on the outer door of Mr. John Carsdale’s chambers. The guest paid no attention to the first summons, but when it was repeated he asked himself lazily whether he had not better see who stood without. He was quite certain that no one could want him, but it might be interesting to know who wanted Carsdale. So, newspaper in hand and cigar in mouth, he lounged forth and opened the door to find a slim, neat-figured young lady, heavily veiled, confronting him. Mr. Werrick gazed curiously at her features and could make nothing of them. He felt somewhat astonished, too, at the fact that the visitor did not speak. Accordingly he himself gave voice.

“Mr. Carsdale?” he said, taking it for granted that the caller wanted his host. “Well, he doesn’t happen to be in.”

The only effect of this intimation was that the veiled lady walked into the chambers and that Werrick retreated before her. And as she crossed the threshold, she raised her veil and revealed to Werrick’s astonished eyes the keen, yet pleasing features of Miss Sophie Guyner. Werrick, in sheer surprise, dropped his cigar.

“Great Scott!” he exclaimed. “So, it’s you?”

Miss Guyner, with characteristic presence of mind, pointed to the outer door, and her host made haste to shut it. He looked at his visitor a little doubtfully.

“I say,” he said. “Carsdale might come back any minute, you know.”

“No!” said Miss Guyner. “He won’t. I know his habits—I ought to. And it wouldn’t matter if he did. I’m equal to any Carsdales. Sit down. No—give me a drink, for I’m thirsty with the heat. Something with a fizz in it. But not champagne, though I dare say there’s plenty in that cupboard. See what else there is.”

Werrick opened the cupboard door in silence, wondering all the time what Sophie wanted. At her command he mixed her a tumbler of light wine and mineral water; he refreshed himself, having the consciousness of a solid breakfast behind him, with something a little stronger. And then, perched on the edge of the table, he looked at Miss Guyner, who had installed herself in Carsdale’s easiest chair, and his look was full of inquiry. Nevertheless, Miss Guyner’s first remark was also of inquiry.

“So you’re here, are you?” she said.

“I’m here,” answered Werrick. “Right here.”

Miss Guyner looked him carefully up and down, from tip to toe.

“Well,” she observed, reflectively. “You look like as if it was time you’d got somewhere. I’ve seen you much worse, but still, you do look as if it would soon be time you went where they keep things ready to put on as soon as you lay down the cash.”

“If you’d only looked in this afternoon,” remarked Mr. Werrick, slapping his trousers pocket, “you’d have found me in purple and fine linen.”

“A nice tweed suit—grey or brown—and a coloured shirt would look better,” said Miss Guyner. “Quiet patterns, of course.”

Mr. Werrick took another pull at his tumbler, and mentally congratulated Carsdale on his taste in whiskey and his make of soda-water.

“And how did you find me, Sophie?” he inquired, almost affectionately.

“I heard Carsdale tell her last night—or, rather, this morning,” answered Miss Guyner. “She thought I was asleep, but I wasn’t. I’m often—very often—awake when she thinks I’m asleep. It pays me to keep my ears open. I didn’t hear all that they said, but I heard plenty to learn that you were here. And so, naturally, I came to see you.”

Mr. Werrick left his seat on the table, took one on the arm of Miss Guyner’s chair, and putting his arm round her shoulders, kissed her.

“You were always a good sort to me, Sophie,” he said. “I’ve thought an awful lot about you.”

“And I’ve thought a good lot about you,” said Miss Guyner. “A good deal more than you deserve. Now, then, that’ll do for the present. What are you up to, Sydney Werrick?—what’ve you come over here for?”

Mr. Werrick re-seated himself on the edge of the table, having first chosen and lighted a fresh cigar.

“What did I come over here for?” he repeated reflectively. “What am I up to? Well, I just guess that I’m going to make John Carsdale and Mrs. Sylvie Werrick do something in the way of compensating me for the trick they played on me over there in New York. And I also guess that Carsdale, at any rate, knows it. So he was with her last night, was he?”

“He was there last night,” answered Miss Guyner, “and I heard enough to know that he impressed it upon her that whatever it is they’re up to, you’d have to come in at it. But——”

She paused abruptly and gave her hearer a nod full of meaning.

“Yes?” asked Mr. Werrick, interestedly. “Yes? And——”

“You keep your eyes skinned,” said Miss Guyner. “Not so much for him as for her. She gets cunninger and cunninger every day. She’s up to something now, or I’m a Hottentot.”

“Um!” said Mr. Werrick. “About this young dude, now? Was she going to marry him, straight?”

“She was,” affirmed Miss Guyner.

Mr. Werrick looked into his tumbler.

“She can marry him to-morrow, for anything I care,” he remarked carelessly. “But of course, she can’t. Has she had much out of him, now?”

“There hasn’t been time,” replied Miss Guyner.

“Last night I saw her wearing a diamond necklace,” observed Mr. Werrick. “Real, Sophie?”

“Real enough! It’s worth every cent of ten thousand pounds, that necklace,” said Miss Guyner, with enthusiasm. “But—she carried it off to the bank this morning.”

Mr. Werrick emptied his tumbler and set it down with a deep sigh.

“Ah!” he said. “That’s a pity. If that bit of property, Sophie, had come into my hands, and had been converted, as it would have been, into good solid cash, the proceeds would have gone a long way towards advancing a certain little scheme which I have in view, and in hearing of which you would be greatly interested.”

“Why should I be interested?” inquired Miss Guyner, watching him narrowly.

“Because you may be inclined to take a partnership in it,” answered Mr. Werrick. “The fact is, Sophie, I’m sick of knocking about, and I want to settle down. I’ve been right away out West, and I’m returning West—as soon as I’ve collected capital. I came over here to collect capital, and I was highly gratified, when I met Carsdale last night, to find that I was going to have a better time than I’d anticipated. I hadn’t figured on it that Carsdale would be able to command so much money. Now that I know he can, well, I’m just going to have what I want, and then I’m going back—to settle down.”

“At—what?” asked Miss Guyner.

“At fruit farming,” replied Mr. Werrick. “Fruit farming. California. The loveliest climate in the world, and the most dependable. You’ve nothing to do but see your fruit grow, ship it off, and rake in the dollars. That’s what I’m going to do. And you shall come with me, Sophie.”

“We’ll see,” answered Miss Guyner in matter-of-fact tones. “I might, if it seems to promise well. But your present game, Syd, is to watch those two. Both Carsdale and her will do you if you’re not sharp. I tell you she’s up to something now. And I dare say he is.”

Mr. Werrick’s eyes grew sombre and his brow threatening.

“I’ll watch ’em!” he observed.

“You thought to watch ’em in New York, and they were up and out to Europe, leaving you there to face the music, before you as much as knew they were after anything,” said Miss Guyner.

“Yes, that’s so,” agreed Mr. Werrick; “but I believe Carsdale wants to sort of make up for that trip. In fact, I think he’s got something for me to do that’ll be useful to him.”

“Mind you’re paid in advance, then,” said Miss Guyner. “Now, about her. I can keep an eye on her as long as she stops at the flat. And I can post you up. And that’s the real reason why I came down here this morning—we must meet somewhere.”

“Sure,” said Mr. Werrick. “But where? You know best.”

“Yes,” remarked Miss Guyner. “We mustn’t write, and it isn’t safe to telephone, because, after all, I’m never certain when she mayn’t be in. Do you know Tottenham Court Road, Sydney?”

“I know there is such a street, and maybe I’ve been in it,” replied Mr. Werrick. “Off Oxford Street, isn’t it?”

“It is, and a few doors along it, and on the left-hand side, there’s a little restaurant called Cyrano’s,” answered Miss Guyner. “Now, for the present, you drop in there at twelve noon, and at nine in the evening, and meet me there, and I’ll give you the news. Start to do that to-night. And now I’m off, and you’d better do your shopping and smarten up.”

So Miss Guyner returned to Bloomsbury, and Mr. Werrick went out to expend some of his hundred pounds, and he bought himself two good and quiet suits, and a complete furnishing of linen and small articles. He amused himself for the rest of the day in sober and innocent fashion, but he contrived to walk down Norfolk Street and to view Abbotsbury House from the outside. And after dining quietly at an unpretentious café, he set out for Cyrano’s Restaurant, and in Oxford Street was seen by an American-looking person who immediately took such interest in him that he turned and followed him. The interest increased; the American-looking person followed Mr. Werrick to the very trysting-place and, having watched him enter, entered after him.

CHAPTER XXV
THE BLANK CHEQUE

Left alone to her own reflections, and with the sure consciousness that the castle in Spain which she had recently been building had fallen into dust and fragments about her ears, Mrs. Walsingham, on Carsdale’s departure, immediately set to work to consider her position. She knew that everything had gone wrong, that the pleasant and easy-going present had vanished like a morning’s dream. It had seemed to her, for at any rate a few days, that all was going well with her. She meant to marry young Richard; what was more, she had made up her mind that she would be a good wife and would take care of him and his money; she would even manage Carsdale in respect to the last matter. It would be very easy, in her opinion, to live a godly and sober life when you were married to an equable-tempered young man who had twenty thousand a year at his command, and she proposed to live up to the standard of high respectability. And now, without warning, all that fair prospect had vanished, been blotted out, and she was faced with the naked and ugly fact that once more she would have to fight for her own hand. And for the space of two minutes she heartily cursed the dead Sandy Kinahan and the living Sidney Werrick and the evil fortune that had brought matters to this untimely pass.

The most serious factor in the sum of Mrs. Walsingham’s difficulties was, of course, the man who by the laws of England was her husband. She allowed herself to remember certain previous incidents of her life. She remembered a boy-and-girl marriage, and a whirl of gaiety and excitement afterwards as long as Sydney Werrick’s money lasted; then a period of adventure which was always exciting but seldom pleasant. She remembered a shifty and daring time in New York, in which John Carsdale played a considerable part, and from which she and Carsdale escaped by the skin of their teeth, leaving Werrick to fall into the hands of justice and to find an asylum in Sing Sing. They had heard of him afterwards as having drifted West, and Sandy Kinahan’s news of his death had filled them both with joy, for Sydney Werrick alive, was always a menace and a danger, and all the more so because he had a quiet and subtle way of doing ugly things. Mrs. Walsingham had an attack of cold perspiration as she thought of her legal lord and master as he might be if an ugly fit took him, and he felt inclined to turn nasty over the remembrance of the New York affair, and her first instinct was to rise and flee, the middle of the night though it was. She fought that impulse down, but the mere knowledge that Sydney Werrick was alive, that he was there in London, that he was once more in touch with her and her world, was quite enough to keep her out of bed and to make her reckon things up with unusual care. After all, she informed herself, self-preservation is the first law of well-regulated nature.

In that moment of cool calculation Mrs. Walsingham calmly blotted out everybody and everything but herself from her world. She dismissed Werrick, and Carsdale, and Richard Shrewsbury—the one and only question was—what was she herself to do in order to safeguard herself? And upon that followed the no less important question—what was she to do it on? In other words, how did she stand financially.

There was little difficulty in arriving at an answer to that question—women of the Sylvie Walsingham type always know how their private ledger shows itself. She knew what she could command. She had about three hundred pounds in ready cash lying at her bank; she possessed jewellery which was possibly worth another six or seven hundred. She had the diamond necklace, and she was very well assured that any jeweller would give her at least nine or ten thousand pounds for it. And she had a blank cheque, which Richard Shrewsbury had forced upon her only two days before, commanding her to fill it up for whatever sum she liked in order to fit herself out for the wedding, which was not to be long delayed. She knew that when he had given her carte blanche in the matter of filling up the cheque he had meant a few hundreds of pounds, or a thousand pounds, and even something more. But there was the cheque, with his bold signature at its foot—and, so far, she had made no use of it. In that cheque lay vast potentialities.

She was still considering these matters, still planning, scheming, debating, when she rose next morning. She had been thinking of them half through what had remained of the night, but she rose at her usual hour and set off for Norfolk Street according to her accustomed routine, carrying the diamond necklace with her and depositing it at her banker’s on the way. And she went through the day’s business calmly and methodically, though the planning and scheming was going on in her mind all the time. The more she thought, the more she was resolved to consider herself and to be free.

Carsdale did not come to the office that day until nearly noon. When they were alone, she looked an eager, if silent, inquiry. Carsdale nodded reassuringly.

“It’s all right,” he said. “He quite understands that he is not to interfere until I want him. You can make your mind easy—he won’t come here, and he won’t interfere with you. Of course, I’ve had to square him with liberal promises, and to give him cash to be going on with. But you’re all right.”

“Where is he?” she asked.

“Left him at my place,” answered Carsdale, carelessly. “With a hundred pounds in his pockets—to fit himself out with. I tell you, there’s no need to worry. Sydney is all right for the present.”

Mrs. Walsingham shook her head.

“You forget,” she said, “that he saw that necklace last night. He would have a very good idea of its value. And if his cupidity is aroused——”

“He fully understands that there’s a bigger game on than that,” interrupted Carsdale, “and he’ll wait. By the by, where is the necklace?”

“At my bank,” she replied.

“Good,” said Carsdale. “Now, don’t worry. Let’s see—is the youngster coming in this morning?”

“He comes in any time, as you know,” she replied. “He may be in—I don’t know.”

“I want to see him if he does come,” said Carsdale. “Don’t let him go until I’ve seen him.”

On that day, however, Richard did not come to Abbotsbury House until after five o’clock. When he arrived he looked surprised and mystified, and he threw a note on Mrs. Walsingham’s desk.

“I’ve been out trying a new car most of the day,” he said, as he dropped into a chair, “but I called in at Berkeley Square as I came along, and found that from Burgoyne—Kedgin says he scribbled it in a big hurry just before he rushed off to catch the afternoon train for Paris. Read it—I don’t understand.”

Mrs. Walsingham read the note which Burgoyne had hastily scrawled on a half-sheet of note-paper.

“Dear Dick,” it ran, “I am off to Paris at a moment’s notice—most important business. I may want you to run over, and if so, will wire you to-morrow before noon—in that case you can catch the 2.20 at Charing Cross. Expect wire about noon in any case.

“In haste, yours affectly.,
“R. B.”

“What does it all mean?” said Richard. “I don’t know of any important business in Paris about which Burgoyne could want me, unless, indeed, it’s something about his company—I know he has some French people interested in it, though I’m shot if I know what use I can be in a business matter. What do you make of it, Sylvie?”

Mrs. Walsingham secretly made of it that Burgoyne’s note was highly convenient to herself. She wanted Richard Shrewsbury out of the way for a few days, and she had been cudgelling her brains all the afternoon as to how she could get rid of him—here, wonderful to relate, was the very means she had wished for.

“Of course you’ll go if he sends for you?” she said, folding up the note.

“Oh, I suppose so, of course,” he answered, half unwillingly. “Though, don’t you know, I was going to take you down to Brighton in this new car to-morrow.”

“That can wait,” she said. “There will be plenty of time for trips to Brighton, later. Of course, I know what Captain Burgoyne wants. He has gone over to Paris to meet the people he mentioned to you as being interested in his South American company, and he no doubt feels that it will give him moral support if you’re at the back of him in his interviews with them. That’s it.”

“Oh, is that it?” said Richard, innocently. “Oh, well, of course, I’ll go—it’ll be rather fun, as I’ve never been in Paris. But I should have thought Carsdale would have been much more likely.”

At that moment Carsdale, bustling and busy, put his head into the room.

“Hullo, Shrewsbury!” he said. “That’s lucky—I just want you—some papers to sign—mere formalities.”

“All right,” said Richard. “Look here”—and he tossed Carsdale the note which Mrs. Walsingham had just read. “Sylvie says Burgoyne probably wants me to give him moral support with the Frenchmen,” he said, laughing. “Don’t you think you’d do better?”

Carsdale read the note at a glance. He, too, was glad to have Richard out of the way for a while. He gave Mrs. Walsingham a glance, and saw that the same thought was in her mind.

“By no means,” he said. “You must go yourself if he sends for you. The probability is that Burgoyne wants to be able to introduce you to some French capitalists as a friend of his who is about to invest largely in his South American company. Oh, you must go, Shrewsbury, of course. Just come into my room and sign those papers, will you?”

Richard, who never asked any why or wherefore of Carsdale, followed his man of business obediently and dashed off his signature at the foot of the documents which Carsdale placed before him. He never read anything that he signed, never asked questions about anything; his faith in Carsdale was complete and absolute. Now, as he pushed the papers away from him, he began to talk about the new car, which was waiting at the door; he induced Carsdale to go down to see it; finally, he whirled Mrs. Walsingham away in it, to dine at an idyllic country hotel which he had recently discovered in Surrey, and Carsdale watched them depart, and laughed as he hastened back to his office.

“That note of Burgoyne’s is a piece of sheer good luck!” he said to himself. “I only hope he’ll send for the youngster.”

By noon the next day Carsdale knew that his hope was fulfilled. Richard turned up at the office with an intimation that he was off to Paris by the two-twenty from Charing Cross. He carried Mrs. Walsingham off to lunch with him, and, meeting Carsdale on the steps, assured him that he should be back within forty-eight hours. Carsdale laughed and clapped him on the shoulder.

“You’ll be an ass, Shrewsbury, if you don’t stay at any rate a week while you are there,” he said. “I shan’t expect you for a week.”

“Of course, he’ll stop a week,” said Mrs. Walsingham. And a little later, when she and Richard were lunching in a private room at the hotel, she checked a tendency to sentiment on his part by telling him that he was silly in wishing to hasten back: he and Captain Burgoyne, she said, would easily find plenty wherewith to occupy and amuse themselves in Paris for a week, or for a fortnight, if they were so minded.

“I wish you were going with me!” said Richard.

“I wish I were, but I’m not, so there’s an end of it,” she answered, quietly. And she remained in the same quiet mood during their leave-taking; and when she had seen the train move away from the platform, and had gracefully waved her hand in reply to Richard’s generous gesticulations, she turned and walked away to the motor-car, which awaited her pleasure, as unconcernedly as if she had just said farewell to a favourite dog or cat which was being shipped to the Antipodes. For always before her was the consciousness of her present perilous situation, and the fear of what might happen if Sydney Werrick suddenly took into his head to play the part of the bad man.

She calmly reviewed the whole state of things that night, and she resolved on her line of conduct for the next day. She consulted a Bradshaw with great care and attention; she made some shorthand notes in her little private memorandum book. And in the privacy of her own room, securely locked in for the night, she took Richard Shrewsbury’s blank cheque from her secret drawer, and laying it on her desk, filled it in with a steady hand for the sum of fifteen thousand pounds.

That night Mrs. Walsingham went to bed and slept long and well.

CHAPTER XXVI
EVERY WOMAN FOR HERSELF

Mrs. Walsingham went out early the next morning fully conscious that she had a hard and a trying day before her. But her excellent night had fitted her for whatever lay in front; now that the critical moment had arrived, she felt something of the joy of battle in her veins; she rose to the occasion with a zest which gave her positive pleasure. She was going to fight for her own hand; by nightfall she hoped to be in a position from which she could, metaphorically, snap her fingers at anything which savoured of the past. So she tripped out of Bloomsbury flats, and went Strand-wards, all unconscious of the fact that Mr. Sydney Werrick, who to his many other accomplishments added that of being able to cleverly disguise himself, watched her emerge and sauntered after her at a comfortably easy pace and distance. But Mr. Werrick, in his turn, was equally unconscious that he, too, was shadowed by a keen-eyed person who had no intention of losing sight of him.

Mrs. Walsingham, following her usual habits, crossed Russell Square, went down Southampton Row and Kingsway to Norfolk Street, and entering Abbotsbury House, remained there for a good hour, during which time Mr. Werrick killed the slow moments by various devices, in which tedious occupation he was imitated by his shadow. Werrick knew already that there was but one entrance and one exit to Abbotsbury House; on it, however much he lounged about Norfolk Street, however deeply he professed to be interested in the kaleidoscopic life of the Strand, as seen from the two corners of the street-top, he kept the eye of a lynx. And at length he saw Mrs. Walsingham emerge, and he followed her to a neighbouring bank; and when she came out of its doors, a few minutes later, he followed her along the Strand. Then Mrs. Walsingham openly and boldly walked into the shop of Mr. Wiertz, and Mr. Werrick took up a position on the opposite side of the street, and wondered what she was doing in the establishment, which was ornamented by the unmistakable sign of the pawnbroker.

Mr. Wiertz, who happened to be in his shop when Mrs. Walsingham entered, was surprised to see her, though he was not sure why he was surprised. That her visit was connected with financial reasons he felt assured, but for the moment he could not surmise what particular kind of financial reasons they might be. He greeted Mrs. Walsingham with great politeness, however, remembering the magnificence in which he had recently beheld her at the Odalium Theatre, and he came bowing and smiling towards her as she entered and fixed an inquiring gaze upon him. Mrs. Walsingham, however, knew that what Mr. Wiertz was really bowing and smiling at was the diamond necklace, or his recollections of it.

“I want to see you in private, Mr. Wiertz,” she said, without preface.

“With pleasure, madam,” replied Mr. Wiertz. He led the way to his sanctum at the extreme rear of the premises, and carefully shut the door upon himself and his customer before he placed his most comfortable chair at her disposal. “We shall not be disturbed here, madam,” he said. “But you are familiar with my little den.”

Mrs. Walsingham laid her handbag on the table and rested an elbow upon it.

“You remember my diamond necklace, Mr. Wiertz?” she said, going straight to her subject. “Of course you do.”

“I remember it, Mrs. Walsingham, and I had the pleasure of seeing you wear it the other night,” answered Mr. Wiertz.

Mrs. Walsingham started and looked a question.

“At the Odalium—close by,” said Mr. Wiertz. “Yes—I indulged myself with a seat at the play. And very beautiful it was—the diamond necklace, I mean, of course.”

Mrs. Walsingham laughed.

“I suppose you couldn’t take your eyes off it?” she said.

Mr. Wiertz bowed. He also smiled, blandly.

“It would, of course, attract you much more than anything you saw on the stage,” continued Mrs. Walsingham. “Yes, I remember that you always had a great liking for my necklace, Mr. Wiertz. You also wanted to buy it. Very well—I want to sell it.”

This blunt announcement produced two effects on Mr. Wiertz. A great wave of joy leapt up in his soul; it was followed by a mightier wave of caution. He took off his spectacles and began to polish them. Previously, Mrs. Walsingham had not wished to sell; now, Mrs. Walsingham did wish to sell. That difference made—all the difference.

“Ah!” he said. “Yes? Now, when I wanted to buy the necklace, I had a customer in view. Now I have no customer in view.”

“That’s of no consequence,” said Mrs. Walsingham, with fine indifference. “It doesn’t make the slightest difference in the value of the stones, you know. I remarked that I want to sell the necklace, just as it is. How much will you give me for it, Mr. Wiertz—prompt cash?”

“Oh, dear!” exclaimed Mr. Wiertz. “I—I am not thinking of buying anything so very——”

Mrs. Walsingham stopped him with a glance.

“Don’t let’s waste time in foolish talk, Mr. Wiertz,” she said. And, as if to show how practical she meant to be in the matter, she unlocked her bag, took out a case and unveiled the diamond necklace before him. “You know you want to buy this,” she continued, “and now I’m prepared to sell it to you. You made me an offer once before—I didn’t really know the worth of the stones, then. Now, I do. And so—how much are you going to offer me—cash?”

Mr. Wiertz took up the diamond necklace and examined it carefully. His fingers trembled a little as he put it down again.

“I had an immediate customer at that time,” he protested. “Now, it is too late, and if I bought this, I should have to wait, and to look about me, and——”

“Stuff!” said Mrs. Walsingham. “And nonsense, too. You know as well as I do that if you buy that necklace you can sell it again within twenty-four hours and make an enormous profit. What you’re calculating at this moment is how you can beat me down so that you can increase that profit. But you won’t, Mr. Wiertz. I’ve got my own price on that diamond necklace, and I’m going to have it. It doesn’t matter whether you give it to me or not. Because, if you don’t somebody else will.”

Mr. Wiertz rubbed his hands together and smiled feebly.

“How—how much do you want?” he asked.

“Ten thousand—cash,” answered Mrs. Walsingham, promptly.

“Oh!” exclaimed Mr. Wiertz. “Oh, really, it’s—impossible.”

Mrs. Walsingham swept the necklace, case and all, into her handbag. She made signs of departure.

“Impossible!” repeated Mr. Wiertz. “I—I couldn’t sell at a profit on that. Say—we’ll say eight thousand, dear lady.”

“I’ve said what I want,” replied Mrs. Walsingham. “And what I want, I’ll have. Ten thousand is my price.”

“I might go to eight thousand five hundred,” said Mr. Wiertz. “You see——”

“I only see that you’re wasting time,” responded Mrs. Walsingham. “I tell you I can get ten thousand elsewhere.”

Mr. Wiertz hesitated. Finally he stretched a hand towards the bag.

“Well, well, let me see it again,” he said. “Really, you are very extortionate, you know, and my profit would be——”

Mrs. Walsingham handed the necklace to him again.

“Ten thousand—not a penny less,” she said.

The jeweller examined the necklace still more closely. At last he turned to his desk.

“How do you want it, then?” he asked. “A cheque?—or I can send out and get you notes if you like?”

“If you please,” said Mrs. Walsingham. She sat back in the easy chair, and put the tips of her fingers together. “You’ve got a good bargain there, Mr. Wiertz—you know you have.”

“But I shall have to find a customer,” said Mr. Wiertz, as he began to write a cheque. “You ladies are so cruel when it comes to bargaining.”

The keen-eyed gentleman who was watching Mr. Sydney Werrick had by this time become aware that Mr. Werrick was watching some other person, and he accordingly waxed anxious to know who that other person was. So when Werrick suddenly woke up from lazy contemplation of the Strand and its crowds, and turned eastward again, his shadow looked about him to see whom he shadowed, and he was not long in deciding that Werrick’s attentions were fixed on the neatly-gowned little lady who made her way back to Norfolk Street. And his sharp eyes saw that she carried a handbag which was secured to her wrist by a chain which was something more than ornamental. After that, he watched his man more keenly than ever.

Mrs. Walsingham re-entered Abbotsbury House and stayed there for half an hour. When she came out she went up into the Strand and boarded a City omnibus. She boarded it at a moment when there was a block in the traffic; Werrick, superbly confident in his disguise, took advantage of this to board the same bus. Mrs. Walsingham got a seat within the vehicle; Werrick climbed to the top and took good care to see who got on and who got off whenever the bus stopped between that point and the City. As for the man who was following Werrick, and who knew him quite well in spite of his disguise, he openly followed Mrs. Walsingham into the bus, being assured by that time that if he kept an eye on her he would also be keeping an eye on the man who rode above their heads.

In this close companionship these three people rode down into the heart of the City. At the Mansion House, Mrs. Walsingham got out of the omnibus, and betook herself into Threadneedle Street. Werrick followed; the shadow followed him. Mrs. Walsingham entered the doors of a well-known private banking firm; Werrick lounged past them, turned, retraced his steps and met his shadow face to face. The shadow knew that he was safe; Werrick showed no sign of sudden recognition; showed nothing: he did not, indeed, seem to see the man whose eyes met his. And the man congratulated himself, and passing on, paused at a convenient point, and thenceforward kept a look-out for the grey Homburg hat which crowned his quarry’s dark face.

The private bank into which Mrs. Walsingham had gone was that whereat Richard Shrewsbury kept his account. She was known there, for she had often transacted business over its counters for both Richard himself and for Carsdale, and when she presented her cheque for fifteen thousand pounds, accompanied by a slip stating what notes she wanted the amount in, it was duly honoured with no more delay than was necessary in counting and checking the notes. And if the two men who were watching outside, each with different motives, had but known it, Mrs. Walsingham presently went off with twenty-five thousand pound’s worth of Bank of England notes in her handbag. But whatever Werrick might guess and the other man wonder at, they knew nothing certain, and the chase began again, Werrick following Mrs. Walsingham, and the keen-faced man following Werrick.

Mrs. Walsingham went away to Lombard Street, and there turned into the Anglo-Austrian Bank. The man who was shadowing Werrick saw her enter; he also saw Werrick pass the door in his sauntering, seemingly purposeless fashion. He himself, hesitating as to what he should do next, turned his attention from his quarry for a moment; when he looked round again, Werrick had disappeared. The shadow hastened his steps looking everywhere; Werrick was nowhere to be seen. Then the shadow, hastily inventing an excuse, entered the bank, and asking a question over the counter of the first clerk he saw, contrived to take a view of the people about him. His man was not amongst them, nor was the woman his man had been following. And though the shadow hung about for some time, he saw neither Mrs. Walsingham nor Werrick again. The truth was that Mrs. Walsingham, having come there by appointment, was transacting some private business in an inner room, and that Werrick, having found out all that he wanted just then, had slipped round a corner, negotiated some courts, and was going back West to meet Sophie Guyner. Eventually, the shadow, who knew very well that Werrick was living at certain chambers in Jermyn Street, and who had no concern with Mrs. Walsingham, went away. Mrs. Walsingham remained some time at the Anglo-Austrian Bank; when she came out she walked in leisurely fashion as far as the Mansion House. There she was about to board another bus, but instead of doing so, she turned away to a telephone box and spoke to Sophie Guyner, telling her that she was sending Griffkin up to the flat with a couple of theatre tickets for that evening, and that she herself should not be home until late. That done, she found a bus and went back to Norfolk Street, and employed herself in her usual avocations until the end of the afternoon, when she repaired to her favourite Soho restaurant and dined. She gave more time to her dinner than was her wont, and it was twenty minutes to eight when she rose and departed, and went home to Bloomsbury. And there, as he came along the corridor from the direction of her own door, she found herself face to face with Captain Blair.

CHAPTER XXVII
PLAIN TRUTH

The man and the woman, meeting thus suddenly in the silence of the big, barrack-like building, paused involuntarily, and looked at each other in a questioning surprise. To the man, all the difficulty, the delicacy, the undoubted unpleasantness of his position rose up with new and telling force; he realized how thankful he would be to run away from his self-imposed task, and it was only when he thought of the seriousness of that task that his face grew set and his eyes stern. It needed no second glance at set face and stern eyes to tell the woman that trouble stood in her path; she had felt that as soon as she saw the military figure, rendered more striking by the vacant sleeve which was pinned up to the square, well-thrown-out chest advancing upon her. For a moment she blanched, and a sudden pang shot through her heart. She noted it with a vague curiosity, wondering, amongst all her other thoughts, if her heart had become affected. But her woman’s wit, the sense of her own danger, the knowledge that she herself, having got Sophie Guyner out of the way, had only come to the flat to obtain certain articles before leaving it for ever, steeled her nerves. She summoned up a smile of astonishment.

“Captain Blair!” she exclaimed.

Captain Blair made a stiff and ceremonious bow.

“Good evening, Mrs. Walsingham,” he said politely. “I have just called at your flat, but I could get no response to my ring. May I see you for a few moments?”

“Certainly, Captain Blair,” answered Mrs. Walsingham. “I’m sorry you got no answer, but I believe my maid has gone to the theatre. I am usually home before this time, but I’m a little late to-night.”

“I am informed that you were generally to be found at home about a quarter to eight,” said Blair following her along the corridor.

“As a rule,” said Mrs. Walsingham. She produced a latch-key, and opening the door of her flat, motioned her visitor to enter. “Come in, Captain Blair,” she said, and she pointed to the open door of the drawing-room.

Blair walked in, again wishing that he could run away. He glanced rapidly around him and noted the abundant evidences of refinement and taste—the books, the pictures, the old china and glass. But he suddenly remembered another side of his hostess’s character, and he became ice-cold to all but the needs of the moment, which were, after all, that he should speak plainly and firmly.

“Sit down,” said Mrs. Walsingham. She dropped into an easy chair, with her back to the light, and looked at her visitor. And it seemed to Blair that in her eyes there was something of an amused speculation, if not of a careless defiance.

“Mrs. Walsingham,” he began. “I—I have called to see you upon business which is—er——”

“Unpleasant!” she said quickly. “Unpleasant!”

“How do you know that?” asked Blair.

“Because I cannot suppose you would call on any other business,” she answered. “Well, let us discuss it, then—I am pressed for time, for I have to go out again.”

Blair looked at her steadily. He saw that he was dealing with a woman who would probably care little for anything he might say—it would be best, then, perhaps, to be brief and plain, even to the verge of brutality.

“I have called, Mrs. Walsingham, on behalf of my friend, Captain Burgoyne,” he said. “You are doubtless aware that Captain Burgoyne is very much attached to young Mr. Richard Shrewsbury, to whom you are engaged to be married?”

“Well?” said Mrs. Walsingham.

“Captain Burgoyne,” continued Blair, “does not approve of that engagement.”

Mrs. Walsingham laughed.

“He would be glad to see Mr. Shrewsbury released from it,” said Blair.

Mrs. Walsingham laughed again.

“In fact,” said Blair, “Mr. Shrewsbury must be released from it. Must!”

Mrs. Walsingham ceased to laugh. She sat up, and an angry spot showed itself in each cheek.

“Must!” she exclaimed. “And why ‘must,’ Captain Blair? What right has Captain Burgoyne to say ‘must’ to me?”

“I am here to explain to you why Captain Burgoyne says ‘must,’” answered Blair. “The fact is, Mrs. Walsingham, Captain Burgoyne, whether you know it or not, has got what is commonly called the whip hand.”

“Over me?” she said.

“Over you!” said Blair, quietly. “Over you. Unmistakably and undoubtedly, over you. So he gives you an alternative. Either you will give up, dismiss, get rid of—anything you like to call it, so long as the reality is there—young Shrewsbury, or——”

“Or—what?” she demanded sharply.

“Or you go to prison,” answered Blair. “To prison.”

Mrs. Walsingham drew in her breath sharply. She favoured her visitor with a cool and a long stare. Finally she shook her head.

“I am not good at riddles, Captain Blair,” she said. “Will you have the goodness to tell me what this is about.”

“I am quite sure that you know what it is about,” answered Blair. “What I think you do not know is that Captain Burgoyne knows more than you think he knows. You made a false step, Mrs. Walsingham, when you allowed young Shrewsbury to buy the imitation necklace from his friend.”

Mrs. Walsingham showed no sign of agitation or fear. By that time she was ready and prepared for anything, and she turned apparently innocent and wondering eyes on her visitor.

“This is so much Greek to me,” she said lightly. “Be plain, if you please, Captain Blair.”

“Very good,” responded Blair. “Then perhaps I had better tell you what we know——”

She interrupted him with an arch laugh.

“‘We!’” she repeated. “Oh—so you, too, are concerned. I thought as much, the other night.”

“I speak as Captain Burgoyne’s friend,” continued Blair. “What we know is this—Before he left England for South America, three years ago, Captain Burgoyne deposited with your late employer, Mr. Barclay Leverton, a diamond necklace as security for a loan of five thousand pounds. That necklace Mr. Leverton placed in his safe. You abstracted that necklace from that safe very shortly afterwards; you had a facsimile of it skilfully manufactured, and you put the facsimile where the real article should have been. Then you——”

“Wait a minute, if you please,” said Mrs. Walsingham, interrupting him with a lifted hand. “Is this all surmise or is it knowledge?”

“That you shall see for yourself,” replied Blair, “Let me go on. You then went to a well-known jeweller and pawnbroker, who is quite prepared to give evidence against you—ah, I thought that would surprise you, Mrs. Walsingham!—and you pawned the real necklace for a thousand pounds on a special contract, under the terms of which you paid so much interest every six months. Frequently, that jeweller endeavoured to buy the necklace from you, but you would never consent to a sale, and eventually you redeemed the necklace by paying back the thousand pounds which had been lent to you. That was quite recently. You had a deep scheme in your mind. And you believed, Mrs. Walsingham, that Captain Burgoyne was unaware that what had been delivered to him by the late Mr. Leverton’s executors was mere paste! But Captain Burgoyne was not unaware. He discovered that fact almost at once. And—he quickly suspected you. And then, a trap was laid for you. You are a very clever young woman, but you walked into that trap as easily as we could wish.”

Mrs. Walsingham made no answer. She had none to make. For one of the few times in her experience, she was genuinely surprised. She had firmly believed that her dealings and transactions with Mr. Wiertz were sacredly secret—yet here was this man with the stern eyes fully cognizant of them. It might be that he was also cognizant of what had taken place between her and Mr. Wiertz that morning. So she remained silent, listening intently.

“I say you walked into that trap,” continued the level-toned voice. “We were sure that you had the genuine necklace, and so we contrived that you should have the sham one also. We knew that when you had both in your possession you would feel safe. We also knew that you would be sure to begin wearing the real necklace. And we gave you an opportunity of wearing it, and you did wear it. Then, of course, we knew all. It would make a very pretty story in a criminal court, Mrs. Walsingham.”

Mrs. Walsingham gazed at her persecutor with sullen eyes.

“I believe you engineered all that,” she said suddenly. “I’m sure you did. Burgoyne hasn’t the brains to have done it. But you can’t prove anything of it. Whatever it was that Burgoyne sold the boy, the boy bought for genuine, and Burgoyne sold for genuine, and the boy paid his money—ten thousand pounds. What do you say to that, pray?”

“Only that Mr. Richard Shrewsbury’s cheque for ten thousand pounds has never been presented by Captain Burgoyne, and never will be, and that we can prove that what was handed to him was the imitation necklace which you had caused to be manufactured and of which, at that very moment, you possessed the original,” answered Blair. “It’s no use quibbling, Mrs. Walsingham—the case against you is complete. You had better take our terms while we are inclined to be merciful.”

“What do you want?” she asked.

Blair drew out his pocket-book.

“A mere written acknowledgment of the fact that you abstracted the necklace from Mr. Leverton’s safe will do,” he said, producing a sheet of note-paper on which some lines were written. “Perhaps you will read this.”

Mrs. Walsingham looked the confession over.

“I will sign that,” she said. “I did take the necklace.” And she took up a pen from her writing-desk close by and dashed off her signature, and handed the paper back. “And I suppose that’s all?” she asked.

Blair was more than a little astonished at her coolness. The matter seemed to be one of absolute indifference to her. He began to wonder if she was tricking him in some way. Yet—there was her signature.

“All,” he said, “except—the return of the genuine necklace. You must give me that.”

But Mrs. Walsingham shook her head.

“No!” she said firmly. “I shall do no such thing. It is not yours, at any rate. If I give it back to anybody it will be to its legal owner, whether that’s Captain Burgoyne or Dick Shrewsbury. It may belong to one of the two, but it certainly doesn’t belong to you.”

“Captain Burgoyne is at present in Paris,” said Blair.

“And so is the boy,” she remarked. “And I dare say I can guess what has taken him there—now. Burgoyne has got him over so that you could do this dirty work in his absence. All right!—but you’ll get nothing out of me. If either of them want the thing, let them come to me for it.”

“You understand,” said Blair, speaking very slowly, “you understand that this paper which you have signed will be shown to Mr. Shrewsbury. It is scarcely probable that he will care to see you after he has read it and realized what it means.”

Mrs. Walsingham burst into a peal of silvery laughter.

“What do I care whether he cares to see me or not?” she retorted defiantly. “That’s all over and done with. But I can tell you this, you solemn-faced old goose, that in spite of that paper, and in spite of what you say, and in spite of Burgoyne, and of all of you, if I cared to lift a finger, I could have the boy at my feet again—yes, and keep him there! Do you hear that, Captain Blair?”

“I hear it, and I doubt it,” replied Blair.

“Well, I don’t, then,” she said. “However, I’m not going to argue with you. I have business to attend to, and I want to go out. I dare say you can open the door for yourself.”

Blair unconsciously moved a little towards the door.

“I think that even now you scarcely appreciate your position,” he said.

“I appreciate it only too well,” she replied. “Am I to ask you to leave me? Or can’t you take a hint?”

“The necklace——” began Blair, “the necklace——”

“Isn’t yours,” she retorted. “Now, go!”

Blair shook his head, went to the door, let himself out, and left her alone. She sprang to the door and locked it after him. Then, moving quickly, she went into her bedroom, and opening a small safe which was let into the wall, she took from it certain articles of jewellery which she had no mind to leave behind her, together with a pocket-book which contained money.

Suddenly, as she placed these things in her bag, Mrs. Walsingham heard a slight sound in the room she had just left. She turned, and in the gathering gloom saw the door being slowly pushed open towards her. Round its edge were the fingers of a man’s hand—square-nailed, strong, suggestive. She looked, hesitated; then her own hand stole into a pocket of her gown, and her fingers grasped the tiny revolver which she always carried.

CHAPTER XXVIII
A QUESTION OF ACCOUNT

On the morning which followed Richard Shrewsbury’s departure for Paris, Carsdale, turning over the letters which lay on his desk at Abbotsbury House found, on looking at the flap of one envelope, the old-fashioned seal of Mr. Septimus Winch, who kept up the old-time habit of securing his correspondence in a thoroughly dependable way. He tore it open with an exclamation of impatience.

“What does this old ass want?” he muttered, running his eye over the enclosure. “More about Leverton’s affairs, I expect.”

Mr. Winch’s letter, however, gave Carsdale no information: it merely stated that Mr. Winch would feel much obliged if Mr. Carsdale would call upon him at eleven o’clock. Carsdale glanced at his watch, it was already ten minutes to the hour named. He went to his safe, took out the papers which Richard had signed so hastily the previous day, put them into his breast pocket, and caught up his hat and umbrella.

“Mrs. Walsingham been in?” he asked as he strode through the outer office.

Griffkin replied that Mrs. Walsingham had been in, and had gone out again, before Mr. Carsdale arrived.

“Tell her, when she comes in, that I shall be in and out all day, but out most of the time, and that she isn’t to make any appointments for me,” said Carsdale. “I may be out all the time.”

Then he hurried off to Lincoln’s Inn, wondering what Mr. Winch wanted, and grumbling because he himself was anxious to get down to the City in order to carry out certain plans which he had been maturing in his mind since the previous day. He was not well pleased, on reaching the old lawyer’s office, to be kept waiting five minutes beyond the appointed time, nor did it increase his good temper, when he was admitted to Mr. Winch’s private room, to find Frances Leverton there. He bade solicitor and client a curt good-morning, and he was too much preoccupied with his own affairs to notice that neither offered to shake hands with him.

“Good morning, Miss Leverton; good morning, Mr. Winch,” said Carsdale, in his usual rapid manner. “I have very little time to spare this morning, and I only got your note as I was starting out for the City, but I thought I would call in. What can I do for you, Mr. Winch?”

Mr. Winch waved his hand to a chair.

“Sit down, Mr. Carsdale, sit down,” he said. “I dare say we shall not detain you very long: it depends largely on yourself. Miss Leverton had asked me to see you on her behalf, but all things considered, I thought it best that she should see you with me. So she is here.”

“Yes?” said Carsdale, impatiently. “Yes?”

Mr. Winch put the tips of his fingers together.

“The fact is, Mr. Carsdale,” he said slowly, “the fact is, Miss Leverton, who has, as I believe you know, a sure aptitude for business matters, has been gradually going through her late father’s papers and winding up his concerns since his death.”

“Just so,” said Carsdale. “So I understand. I offered my assistance to Miss Leverton.”

“I think Miss Leverton has done very well without it,” said Mr. Winch, dryly, “though I am sure it might have been most valuable. Now, Mr. Carsdale, Miss Leverton has naturally brought to light certain matters with which she had not been familiar during her father’s life. With some of those matters you were concerned; with one or two of them very intimately concerned.”

Carsdale showed signs of impatience.

“No doubt, no doubt,” he said. “There are still matters between us which are not cleared up. I have more than once put myself at Miss Leverton’s disposal in those matters, but she has never taken advantage of my offer.”

“No, sir, because those matters were not worth attending to!” said Mr. Winch. “But there was a matter which was worth attending to that you did not mention to Miss Leverton, nor to me, nor to anybody.”

Carsdale, under his impatient surface, was all attention. He had a clear notion of what was coming, and he was thinking hard as to how to meet it, what to say, and what to do.

“To what do you refer, Mr. Winch?” he asked calmly.

“I refer, sir, to the matter of the Chilwhele Mine Concession,” replied Mr. Winch, with a stern glance. He laid his hand upon a pile of papers at his side, tapping it significantly. “Here are the documents, sir. It is only by the greatest skill and the utmost patience, Mr. Carsdale, that Miss Leverton has got at the truth of that matter—her father never knew it. But we, his legal representatives, know it. Now, sir, I am going to tell you the plain truth, and I tell you it advisedly, staking my reputation as a solicitor upon what I say. You subjected my late client, Barclay Leverton, to a mean fraud!”

“Fraud is a strong word, Mr. Winch,” said Carsdale.

“It is a strong word, and an ugly word, and a nasty word, sir!” retorted the old solicitor. “And it is the only word to use in this case. Fraud!”

Carsdale shrugged his shoulders.

“Abuse me, if it pleases you, Mr. Winch,” he said quietly. “All the abuse you can shower on me is a matter of indifference to me. And——”

“It will not be a matter of indifference to you, sir, when a Scotland Yard man taps you on the shoulder,” said Mr. Winch, angrily. “I know a case of common fraud when I see one. It is a wonder you have been found out, for you are a clever fellow, Mr. Carsdale, but found out you are, and you shall learn it.”

“And you may threaten me as you please,” said Carsdale, “for all your threats are as indifferent to me as your abuse. But perhaps you and Miss Leverton will allow me to give my version of this matter—I believe that even a prisoner may speak in his own defence. This affair of the Chilwhele Mine Concession, Mr. Winch, is a mere question of account. Now, hear me,” he continued, as the old solicitor raised a hand in protest. “Whatever you say, it is a question of account, and nothing else: it is a question of very intricate account, and that is the reason why there has been so much delay in settling it. I told you just now that there were matters between us—that is, between you, as Mr. Barclay Leverton’s executors, and myself, as an informal partner of his—which were not yet settled up. This is one of them. Now, as it so happens, Mr. Winch, I completed the statement of accounts in that matter only yesterday, and I have it in my pocket-book, and here it is.”

And from amidst the numerous papers in his pocket-book, Carsdale selected one and laid it on Mr. Winch’s desk. It looked to be newly type-written; it was very neat, and precise, and business-like; in reality, it had been in the pocket-book ever since Barclay Leverton’s death, ready for any emergency. The emergency had arisen; the document accordingly made its appearance.

Mr. Winch picked it up with a frown and glanced it carefully over, motioning Frances, who sat at his side, to look at it at the same time. And Carsdale, knowing his advantage, went on in his glib and plausible, and, just then, slightly-injured tones.

“That is a full statement of the matter,” he said. “My books are open to your inspection. You will perceive that there is a balance due to the late Mr. Leverton’s estate of two thousand seven hundred and eighty-five pounds. I was going to send you a cheque for that amount at the end of this week, Mr. Winch. As I am here, and as you have said what you have said, I will give you the cheque now.”

Carsdale drew out his cheque-book and turned to an adjacent table. But Mr. Winch threw down the statement and raised his voice.

“Stop, sir!” he said. “I decline to receive that cheque until I have had this matter fully investigated. I have proof here of what you did in this matter, sir, and it cannot be settled by your sitting down and writing a cheque. I won’t have that cheque, sir—you shall not write it!”

Carsdale laughed contemptuously and went on writing.

“You can no more stop me from writing a cheque, Mr. Winch, than you can stop me from making it payable to you,” he said calmly. “There it is, on your desk—and if you send it back to me, I shall post it to you. You have now statement and cheque, and the matter is closed as far as I’m concerned. And as regards your charge of fraud, Mr. Winch, let me hear of it again, and you shall hear from me. Good day, sir, and good day, Miss Leverton.”

“Stop, sir, stop, I say!” exclaimed Mr. Winch. “I tell you, sir, I——”

But Carsdale only laughed and strode out, and the old solicitor and Frances looked at each other. Mr. Winch suddenly ceased fuming, and shook his head. “That,” he said, “is a man who will always escape by the skin of his teeth! My dear, I am afraid he has been too sharp for us. I wonder if he was speaking the truth? I wonder if he really meant to render an account?”

“If he did, why did he never mention the matter before?” asked Frances. “No—he has been too sharp, as you say. He must have been prepared—I’ll swear we should never have heard word or whisper of the Chilwhele Concession from him if he hadn’t suddenly been plumped with it.”

“Well, well, after all, there’s the cheque,” observed Mr. Winch. “See, he’s left it open—I’ll send it round and see if we can get cash for it.”

“Then we shall accept his version of it and have done with him,” said Frances. “The cheque will be met all right.”

“Let us see—let us see!” said Mr. Winch, a little skeptically. “And after all, my dear, it is the money we want, you know.”

But Frances wanted more than that, and when Mr. Winch’s clerk had been to Carsdale’s bank and had come back with a sheaf of bank-notes, she went away discontented. Carsdale, it seemed to her, had slipped out of the noose she wanted to keep around him. But she had other concerns connected with him to see to, and she went off to see to them.

In a suite of palatial rooms, at the top of an equally palatial building, Frances was soon closeted with a well-gowned, smart woman who might have been the head-mistress of a girl’s high school instead of what she was—the soul and brains of a private detective agency.

“You are still keeping Mr. Carsdale under close observation?” said Frances, who had taken it upon herself to institute a particular surveillance over the movements of her late father’s partner two days before.

“Quite so, Miss Leverton,” replied the head of affairs cheerfully. “I have two of my very best people devoting themselves to him, and there will be a third—a very smart girl who has just joined my staff—on the work this afternoon, when one of the others comes off. And as you are not particular about expenses, I have an especially good man detailed for the evening and night work. Oh, yes!—from the moment Mr. Carsdale left his rooms in Jermyn Street this morning until he goes back to them to-night, he will be continually under observation. We can’t, of course, penetrate into the offices and places of business where he may go, but we shall always know where he is, and whom he calls to see, and so on. Now, here, for instance, is his record of yesterday, you see.”

Frances took the detailed report which the principal handed her and glanced it over with all the awe which attaches to the reading of a secret document. It set forth all Carsdale’s movements of the day before, and she was bound to confess that they all seemed to be very innocent and ordinary, and such as he might reasonably have been expected to make in the way of business. She gave it back without comment.

“I rather gathered,” said the principal, “that you are afraid of this man leaving the country suddenly.”

“Yes,” replied Frances. “I think it very likely that he may do so.”

“Well, it’s a very easy thing for a man to do that, you know,” remarked the principal. “He’s nothing to do but jump into a train or take a swift motor-car down to the coast. And if we should detect him in either of those acts, how are we to stop him? It isn’t as if the police had any warrant out against him. I’m afraid all we can do is to keep you thoroughly posted in his movements while he is in England.”

“That will be a great deal,” said Frances. “I want to know where he is, what he is doing, what is likely to happen. I can tell a good deal from merely knowing where he goes on business.”

Then she went away, reflecting on the wiliness of Carsdale. She was certain in her own mind that if he had not been confronted with the matter by Mr. Winch he would never have mentioned the affair of the Chilwhele Mine Concession to her, never have sent her a cheque. Putting two and two together, she began to get at a gleam of the truth. Carsdale was one of those clever folk who can see rocks ahead and exercise great ingenuity in steering clear of them. And in his hands rested Richard Shrewsbury’s fortune!—why, it might vanish into thin air at any moment, and Carsdale with it. She went home feeling that the events of the morning had been all in the adventurer’s favour. She and Mr. Winch had failed. She had no hold on Carsdale now—the mere cashing of his cheque had destroyed whatever hold she had had, and she recognized that he had gone away from New Square more powerful for trickery than ever.

CHAPTER XXIX
THE SILENT TENANT

Carsdale went away from his interview with Mr. Winch and Frances Leverton conscious of mixed feelings. He was triumphant, and yet he was annoyed; he had scored a success over two people whom he cordially disliked, but his victory had cost him the greater part of three thousand pounds. Although he had always been prepared for this sudden onslaught, he was not a little surprised when it came, and as he walked out of New Square he was puzzling his brains to make out how Frances had worked up the evidence against him, for he himself had begun to believe that he was safe. That young woman, he decided, was a great deal too clever; he began to regret that in past days he had not made up to her; it was evident that she possessed a good business head and knew what figures meant, and she might, under favourable conditions, have been very useful to him. Instead of that, she was his enemy, and, as events had just proved, a formidable one. “Lucky that I was always able to keep a reserve at the bank in case that ever did come up!” he muttered as he made for Fleet Street. “There’d have been the devil to pay with old Winch if I hadn’t taken the upper hand. Well, that’s two thousand seven hundred gone, anyway.”

This amount, however, seemed a mere nothing in comparison with the potentialities which Carsdale carried in the inner breast pocket of his immaculate morning coat. They were simple enough matters in themselves—only two or three papers with Richard Shrewsbury’s signature hastily scrawled at the foot of each, but they—and the signature—gave Carsdale full and entire power to deal with his young client’s fortune. Carsdale, as he chartered a taxi-cab at Temple Bar, was master of a quarter of a million of what was as good as ready money.

The bank at which Richard Shrewsbury kept his account, and whereat the securities lay which Carsdale was now hastening to lay hold of, was an old-established, old-fashioned private concern, belonging to two families, the respective heads of which were staid and sober old gentlemen whose business concerns were of such an eminently respectable nature that they were neither of them given to suspecting evil. And accordingly, when Carsdale interviewed one of them in the private parlour, and presented an order from Richard which empowered him to take such securities as he thought fit, they regarded the matter as one of ordinary business, and made no remark when he selected two hundred thousand pounds’ worth of stock which was convertible into ready money on sight. Polite old gentlemen both, they simply took Richard’s written order and Carsdale’s receipt, and expressed a polite hope that young Mr. Shrewsbury was well and enjoying himself. “Quite well, thank you,” replied Carsdale, in his pleasantest matter. “The fact is that Mr. Shrewsbury contemplates matrimony, and I am accordingly going to put the bulk of his property on a rather better footing. I shall have some even stronger securities for your care presently, gentleman.”

The two old gentlemen said they should always be glad to take care of anything for Mr. Shrewsbury or for Mr. Carsdale. Anything sounder than the present securities they could hardly conceive of; however, if Mr. Shrewsbury was about to marry, perhaps an extra one, or even a half per cent., would be an advantage, and no doubt Mr. Carsdale had something in his eye.

“Oh, an excellent readjustment, excellent—a rare opportunity, gentlemen,” said Mr. Carsdale, cheerily. “One that I must not miss on my young friend’s behalf—a stock that is seldom on the market.”

“We hope Mr. Shrewsbury is making a good marriage?” said one of the partners. “He is still young.”

“Oh, a most excellent marriage—excellent!” answered Carsdale. “A very wise marriage—delightful and clever lady.”

Then he took the securities and went off and plunged into the labyrinths of that mysterious City wherein men play with the signs and symbols of money as children play with pebbles and broken potsherds, and within an hour the securities were sold and Carsdale was commanding two hundred thousand pounds, and had, moreover, so disposed it that it was safely in his own keeping. There was nothing more to do then but to put half the world between him and London, and he meant to do that at once. He had exploited London quite sufficiently, and had not done well out of it; his eyes were turned now to other and uncultivated pastures, where a man of capital might do wonders. And it being then about luncheon time, he turned into a famous City restaurant, and ate and drank with a good heart, and over his subsequent cigar and coffee he consulted certain shipping lists, quite unaware that an innocent-looking, well-dressed gentleman, who had lunched in close proximity to him and had afterwards followed him into the smoking-room, was keeping a close observation on all that he did.

Carsdale like all men of his type had a soft spot, and his particular soft spot was for Mrs. Walsingham. She was not only his cousin, but his pupil in his particular school of finance, and when, as a school-girl, she had made a fool of herself by running away with and marrying Sydney Werrick, he had stood by her, helped her when hard times came, and had eventually taken her and Werrick into a sort of partnership with him in New York, where the three had indulged in certain shady pursuits which had landed Werrick in jail and brought the other two perilously near to the same fate. Carsdale and Sylvie, both filled with a strong and intensely selfish notion of the virtues of self-preservation, had escaped that fate and jumped quickly for England, and there each had met with big strokes of luck and for a time done well. But the luck had died down; Leverton’s death had taken business away from Carsdale; he had made two or three bad speculations; people were beginning to fight shy of him; certain investors were saying nasty things about him; it was time to seek an entirely new field. And the question which chiefly concerned him as he sat in that City smoking-room, idling away the time which he had no mind to spend at his office, was—what was to be done about Sylvie?

He was not going to desert her, he said to himself. That was certain—but he was equally certain and determined that he was not going to be saddled with Sydney Werrick. And the only way in which to get rid of that inconvenient person was to make a prompt start on the part of Sylvie and himself. So far he had said nothing to her of his definite plans, but he knew her well enough to be assured that she would do exactly what he advised and asked her to do. And so, when he had finished his coffee, he walked out once more into the City, and repairing to Moorgate Street, entered the offices of the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company. When he came out, half an hour later, he carried away with him two first-class tickets for Buenos Aires, available by a boat which was due to leave Southampton next morning.

Carsdale now proposed to himself to cut clean adrift from everything. His notion was that if you have done with a thing, you have done with it. He had no need to return for even a moment to the old life. He was carrying upon him two hundred thousand pounds in a form which could easily be converted into cash in any civilized country in the world, and at a moment’s notice; in addition to that he also carried a very considerable sum in notes and a sufficiency in gold. There was no reason whatever why he should revisit his office in Norfolk Street nor his rooms in Jermyn Street. He knew that as Richard Shrewsbury had gone to Paris he would be sure to find Mrs. Walsingham in at night—ten minutes’ conversation with her would be sufficient for his purposes. Never for a moment did it cross his mind that Mrs. Walsingham might be playing her own game, might be making plans of her own. He had become so accustomed to her continual appeals to him for advice that it never occurred to him that she would do anything on her own initiative. So he continued to take all that for granted, and went on making his arrangements under the firm impression that she would readily and willingly fall in with them.

The man who was shadowing Carsdale formed certain conclusions after he saw his quarry enter and leave the shipping office. When, after following him up West, he saw him go to a well-known outfitter’s, whose boast it was that they could supply everybody with anything at a moment’s notice, his conclusions grew stronger, and, taking his chances in his hands, he entered a telephone box, and ringing up his principal, asked for an assistant to be sent to him at once, explaining that he believed his man was contemplating a bolt. Thus, for the rest of the day, Carsdale was shadowed by two men instead of one. But, all unconscious of this, he went steadily on with his preparations. He bought all that was necessary for a sea-voyage at the outfitter’s, had his purchases packed into two portmanteaux, and drove with the portmanteaux to a certain motor-garage in Long Acre. The men who followed him saw the portmanteaux carried inside.

“That’s a sure tip,” said one. “He’s going off by motor. What’s to be done? We can’t stop him.”

“Wait a bit,” replied the other. “He mayn’t be going now. If he leaves those portmanteaux there, we shall know that he means to go from here. That’s the main point. Then we can report.”

Carsdale was steadily carrying out his policy of cutting everything adrift. He possessed a motor-car of his own, a good, serviceable car, which was at that moment standing idle in a West-End garage, and could have been used at once. But he was not in the mood to revisit any of his old and accustomed haunts, and he purposely chose an establishment whereat first-class cars were let out on hire, because he was not known there. He explained carefully what he wanted—a first-rate road car that would run him down to Southampton that night, and he made a selection out of the cars shown him which showed that he knew what he wanted in the way of speed, convenience, and comfort. He paid the hire there and then, saw his portmanteaux deposited in the car, and ordered it to be in readiness at any hour after nine o’clock. Then he left, and the men who were shadowing him saw that he had left his portmanteaux behind, and drew their own conclusions. He meant to come back; he meant to go away—so much was evident. One of them went off to report progress to the principal of the private detective agency; the other continued to follow Carsdale.

It was then getting towards evening, and Carsdale had nothing more to do. He knew that he would probably find Sylvie at her favourite restaurant in Soho if he went there, but he had no mind to be seen anywhere where he was likely to be known or recognized. So he lounged away from Long Acre half-aimlessly, and turning up St. Martin’s Lane continued to kill time by looking at the wares displayed in the second-hand book shops. Between six and seven he strolled into Oxford Street, and suddenly catching sight of Frascati’s decided to go in and dine. That, at any rate, would bridge the time until he went round to Sylvie’s flat.

The man watching Carsdale, seeing him enter Frascati’s, and judging that he meant to dine there, promptly rang up the office, said where he was, and asked for his relief. The relief presently came along in a taxi-cab; the smart young woman of whom the principal had spoken to Frances in the morning. She had shadowed Carsdale for three hours on the previous evening, and she was quite eager for more work of the same sort. When she heard that her man was probably dining, she decided, having high ideas of doing a thing thoroughly, that she would enter the restaurant herself and embrace the opportunity of inspecting Carsdale at close quarters while she, too, dined. She quickly found him and got a seat near him; Carsdale, if he noticed her at all, probably put her down as a well, but quietly-dressed young woman who had taken it into her head to come out and dine by herself. And she, watching him without seeming to do so, decided that, whatever he was after, he was a cool and matter-of-fact individual, for he ate and drank in methodical and leisurely fashion, showed no signs of haste or of unusual thought, and looked indeed for all the world like nothing but a smartly-dressed man who had finished his business and meant to enjoy his evening.

It was a little after eight o’clock when Carsdale finally walked out of Frascati’s and turned towards Tottenham Court Road. The girl slipped out after him, and, before she had gone many yards, was joined by the man whom she had relieved.

“I had an idea that I might be useful to-night,” he said, “so I got some dinner close by, and came back. If he’s going to bolt to-night, two of us will be needed.”

Then they separated, and continued to watch their man from distinct points. And Carsdale, all unconscious of the espionage, went on.

He had not a doubt that all his plans would succeed—a firm faith in his own star had always been one of his chief characteristics, and it was as firm as ever. A very brief conversation and explanation with Sylvie, and they would be off, and by that time next day they would be well on their way down the Channel. His spirits, always sanguine, rose at the thought, and he walked along more briskly, humming a tune.

There were two entrances to the block of flats in which Mrs. Walsingham lived; Carsdale went in by the first he came to, and made his way to her door. He always carried a latch-key to that door, for he sometimes made use of the flat when its occupant was not in. And now, never dreaming of anything untoward or wrong, he opened the outer door, and walking in, and seeing inner doors open, called Mrs. Walsingham’s name. There was no answer to his call, and something in the silence of the place suddenly struck him with a sense of uneasiness. He hesitated; then walked into the nearest room. And there, lying across the threshold of Sylvie’s bedroom, he saw a huddled and motionless figure, and knew it instinctively for that of a dead man.

CHAPTER XXX
BURGOYNE FACES THE MUSIC

Captain Ralph Burgoyne, installed at the Hôtel Bristol, in Paris, awaited young Richard Shrewsbury’s arrival with about as much pleasure as a dentist’s patient, sitting in a luxuriously-appointed reception-room awaits the summons to that other room in which the practical part of the business is transacted. He had been in some tight places in his life, he said to himself, but never in a hole which was so absolutely detestable to all his tastes and ideas as this was. He had been in action more than once; he had known the tortures of hunger in one continent and the agonies of thirst in another; he was not quite sure whether he would not have undergone battle, thirst and hunger again rather than tell young Dick Shrewsbury what he had to tell him. For Burgoyne knew that the lad believed in Carsdale and in Mrs. Walsingham, and like all simple and honest men, he hated to be obliged to prove to a very young man that the pillars on which the edifice of his trust had rested were of uncommonly rotten clay. That revelation, that discovery, might, he felt, sour and embitter the youngster for life. But—it had to be done.

It was all the harder to do because of Richard’s high spirits. It was late at night when he arrived, but nothing would content him but to drag Burgoyne out in order to get a glimpse of this wonderful Paris at once, especially at midnight. He kept Burgoyne out of bed until an unholy hour; even then, when they had got to their rooms, he began to be inquisitive about Burgoyne’s reasons for fetching him over.

“Business, of course,” he said.

“Well, of course, I don’t know anything about business, but whatever it is, depend on me, old chap. Carsdale said it must be business—you’d a lot better have had Carsdale here, Burgoyne. But what is it, anyway? Your company, I expect.”

Burgoyne succeeded in producing a prodigious yawn.

“Oh, to-morrow!” he said. “Time enough to-morrow—I’m half asleep.”

But he slept little when he got to his bed and his countenance was melancholy when he met Richard at breakfast. The younger man rallied his senior on it, and Burgoyne made an excuse about his liver. The truth was that he was fighting down an inclination to put off the evil moment; as he looked at the boy’s young and eager face he felt as if he were going to stab him in the back. And yet, Heaven knew, he was only anxious, desperately anxious, to save him from a fate at the mere thought of which he himself shuddered.

“Hang it all, pull yourself together, man!” he said, addressing himself, and cursing his own cowardice. “The thing’s got to be done, and it’s best to do it at once.”

He carefully engineered his charge to the Bois du Boulogne when they went out after breakfast, and got him to himself on a seat in a quiet corner. The air was full of summer, and the trees were green, and there was water splashing like diamond sprays in the sunlight, and there were children and their nursemaids about, and everything was gay and pleasant, and Burgoyne miserably contrasted it with the sordid story which it was laid upon him to unfold. And suddenly, after he had spent some silent moments in tracing patterns upon the gravel at his feet, he burst into his subject, violently and awkwardly.

“I say, Shrewsbury!” he said. “About this—this business that I asked you to come over and see me about, you know.”

“Yes?” answered Richard.

“I—you see, it wasn’t about my business that I wanted to speak to you,” said Burgoyne. “It was about—yours.”

Richard turned from the contemplation of a nursemaid, who was flirting with a portly policeman, to stare at his companion in astonishment.

“Mine?” he said.

“Yes, by Jove, yours!” replied Burgoyne. “I—look here, youngster, you look on me as a friend, don’t you? You trust me, eh?”

Richard stared more than ever. Then, with a sudden impulse, he stretched out a hand and laid it on the elder man’s arm.

“Dear old chap!” he said. “I look on you as—why, as a sort of second father. Of course!”

“I’m deuced glad to hear it, boy,” said Burgoyne, fervently. “Deuced glad! It—it makes it come easier, what I’ve got to say. Got to say, you understand, Dick? I don’t want to say it—hate to say it, by Gad!—but I’ve got to.”

Richard began to have an idea that something as unpleasant as it seemed to be important was in the air.

“What is it, Burgoyne?” he asked quietly.

“It—it’s a damned nasty thing to have to talk about, sir,” said Burgoyne, viciously assaulting the gravel with his walking-cane. “I wish I could talk of something else. It’s about—about Mrs. Walsingham.”

Richard stiffened.

“What about Mrs. Walsingham?” he asked. “Remember, I’m engaged to be married to her.”

“I do remember it, sir, and that’s what makes things so confounded awkward, and—and ugly,” said Burgoyne. “It’s only because I’m—fond of you, and anxious about you, and all that, don’t you know, that I’m speaking to you. You see, I know what you don’t know. It’s—it’s about that damned diamond necklace, which I wish to Heaven I’d never seen.”

Richard was staring at a fountain which was throwing up sprays of liquid fire amongst the trees in front of them. He knew by that time that Burgoyne had some revelation to make to him; he guessed from his manner and his reluctance that it was something unpleasant.

“You’d better tell me straight out what all this is,” he said.

“Then I’ll ask you to understand that every word I’m going to say to you is the truth, lad,” said Burgoyne, emphatically. “Not what I believe to be the truth, but the absolute, provable truth. Every word that I say to you can be substantiated. You know that I left my diamond necklace in pledge with Barclay Leverton.”

“Yes,” replied Richard.

“You were with me when I redeemed it—or thought I did—from Leverton’s executors—his daughter and his solicitor?”

“I was.”

“What I got there wasn’t my necklace at all,” said Burgoyne. “It was a paste imitation. I found that out the morning I went with you to Levanter’s, in Bond Street, to buy that ring. Or, rather, Levanter found it out. Paste, sir! I didn’t say a word to you, but I had some suspicion, and I began to make inquiries. My necklace, Dick, had been stolen while it was in Barclay Leverton’s possession, though he knew nothing about it. And—take it steady, my boy, hard though it is!—it was stolen by Mrs. Walsingham. That’s the absolute truth—truth!”

Richard made no answer. He, too, leaned forward and began to trace unmeaning patterns in the gravel. And Burgoyne, scarcely daring to look at him, went on hurriedly.

“The real necklace, sir, my necklace, was stolen by Mrs. Walsingham from Barclay Leverton’s safe,” he continued. “She pawned it at once. She got it back after I returned home; she had it in her possession all the time I had the paste thing—which she got made—at Levanter’s. What I sold you was the paste thing, and I knew it at the time. Your cheque is here, in my pocket-book—see, here it is, and there you are—you can tear it up, or keep it, or do what you like with it. It was by selling you that paste affair that we found out the truth, or, rather, established it.”

“‘We’?” said Richard. “Whom do you mean by ‘we’?”

“Blair and myself. We laid the trap—we knew, really, by then, but for your sake, we wanted to make absolutely certain,” replied Burgoyne. “I’ll tell you all the details—you’ll see, then, youngster, that you’re getting the truth, ugly as it is. And I hope I shall never be mixed up in such a dirty business in my life again, sir, never!”

Richard sat in stony silence while Burgoyne told him the whole story. He knew Burgoyne: he knew he was hearing the truth. And he was conscious, all the time that he listened, of a certain feeling of restored freedom. He had often realized, in moments when he had time to think calmly, that he had asked Mrs. Walsingham to marry him through sheer impulse, and, in spite of a naturally loyal disposition, he had been tempted to ask himself if he would have made her that offer in a calmer mood. Now, he knew that he would never marry her, and he asked himself whether he was glad or sorry to know it.

“There, that’s all, and now I’ve done my duty!” said Burgoyne, when he had made an end. “Gad, sir, it’s the most unpleasant thing I’ve ever done in my life—but, my lad, it’s what your father would have had me do, don’t you know.”

Richard laid his hand on Burgoyne’s arm and pressed it.

“Thank you, Burgoyne,” he said. “I know you. Now, why didn’t you tell me all this in London? Why get me over here?”

“We thought it best, Blair and I,” answered Burgoyne. “We thought you’d better be clear of things for a day or two, while Blair spoke to—her.”

“Ah!” said Richard. “So Blair is going to speak to—her?”

“He is, sir,” said Burgoyne. “My boy, don’t you see, you must be got out of the hands of those two. You’ve taken this well—you’re a good lad—and you must hear me out. You must have no more to do with this woman, or with Carsdale.”

“Carsdale?” exclaimed Richard. “Carsdale!”

Burgoyne was quick to note the surprise in the lad’s tones; he was somehow conscious of a shrewd suspicion that Richard would feel it more to hear of Carsdale’s treachery than of the woman’s.

“Yes,” he said. “I know you’ve a great belief in Carsdale. But it’s no use denying it, Dick, the man has a bad reputation. You don’t know all that I know. To keep up any business relations with him is to be cheated in the end—perhaps ruined. Indeed, my boy, you don’t know!”

Richard stood up; a far-away look came into his eyes, and his lip curled.

“It seems to me,” he said, slowly and bitterly, “it seems to me, Burgoyne, that I don’t know anything. I have had one blow this morning—now I get another. I have trusted in Carsdale fully. He was kind and obliging to me when I came, a stranger, and my bankers complimented me on the excellent investments he made for me. I’ve never found him untrustworthy in anything.”

Burgoyne groaned and shook his head.

“My dear Dick!” he said. “My dear boy! I know how beastly it is to hear these things. But I’m telling you the truth—I’ve wormed things out for your sake. Carsdale is a deep dog—a crafty dog, sir. It has never struck you that from every one of the tradesmen he took you to he would get a very handsome commission; it has never occurred to you that it was his policy at first to make those investments so as to establish confidence. But now, tell me, Dick, as you’d tell your father—have you ever entrusted money to him to do as he liked with?”

“Yes—ten thousand pounds,” replied Richard promptly.

“You’ll never see it again, my lad, you’ll never see it again!” exclaimed Burgoyne. “Tell me further, since we’re at it—have you ever signed any papers for him that you didn’t read?”

“I signed some papers yesterday afternoon,” answered Richard. “I didn’t read them.”

“Oh, my God!” said Burgoyne. “I wish I’d spoken sooner. Boy, the man’s a swindler! He defrauded Leverton out of a considerable sum of money—Frances Leverton has found it out, she’s going to hold it over him—hold the threat of prosecution over him, I mean—for your sake.”

Richard flushed.

“For my sake?” he said. “Miss Leverton?”

“Winch is tackling him to-day on it,” answered Burgoyne. “It’s the only hold we have on him. If he doesn’t give up all connection with you, release everything he has of yours, they’ll prosecute him on the other matter. It was the only way, lad. If your friends don’t save you from the fellow, you’ll be ruined—ruined! I got you over here to keep you out of the way while—while Blair and Miss Leverton did what they could with the woman and him. What is it, boy?”

Richard was sternly motioning him to rise.

“Come on, Burgoyne,” he said. “I’m off back to London. You all mean well—kindly—all of you. But I’ll fight for myself, though I won’t refuse the help of any of you. You meant well, old chap, but oh, why didn’t you tell me of this on the spot? Come on—let’s be off!”

But Burgoyne had a business appointment for the afternoon which he was bound to keep, and it was not until late in the evening that they could leave Paris. Richard fumed and fretted at the delay, and was moody and taciturn throughout the journey. It was early morning when they reached Charing Cross and turned into the hotel for breakfast. And there Burgoyne, taking up a morning newspaper, saw the first brief news of what had happened on the previous evening at Mrs. Walsingham’s flat.

CHAPTER XXXI
WAS IT MURDER?

Carsdale, arrested in his progress across Mrs. Walsingham’s drawing-room by the sight of the still figure which lay on the threshold of the inner door, knew with a sure prescience of coming evil that here was trouble—bad, black trouble. He stood staring around him, astonished, afraid. The whole place was so still, so very quiet, that he knew he was absolutely alone there with the thing which lay almost at his feet—the thing which he knew, from its attitude, its motionlessness, to be dead. His lips suddenly grew dry, his tongue parched, his fingers began to twitch aimlessly—Carsdale was badly upset and frightened; the exclamation that presently burst from him seemed to rattle in his mouth.

“My God!” he whispered. “What—what’s this?”

The room was dull and sombre in the fast-gathering twilight; although the dead man lay face upward, his hands clutching frenziedly at the top of his waistcoat, Carsdale could not distinguish his features from where he stood. But he presently crept nearer, holding by the edge of the table, and at last, getting close up to the body, he bent fearfully down and looked at the face, and recoiled as he recognized it.

“Sydney Werrick!” he said. “Sydney Werrick! God in Heaven!—he’s dead.”

Then he braced himself and stretched out a finger, and touched the dead man’s forehead and one of the clenched hands. And again he started back, for the flesh was still warm. And then Carsdale knew that he had arrived just too late to avert a tragedy. His bewildered mind began to clear; some dim realization of what had happened woke up in him. Mechanically he moved to the wall, and, pressing a switch, turned on the electric light. In its full glare he looked from where he stood at the dead man’s face. And he was thankful, then, to see that the eyelids were closed.

Carsdale turned back out of the drawing-room, went into the dining-room, and going to the cellaret in the sideboard, found brandy, and tossed off half a tumbler at a gulp. The spirit steadied his shaken nerves; his natural resourcefulness began to assert itself. He stood for a moment, thinking. The question was—what was to be done?

He realized by that time that a tragedy had happened of which he had never conceived the possibility. He knew very well that this was no case of suicide—Sydney Werrick was not the man to take his own life under any circumstances; he was much too fond of it, especially when he had money in his pocket and the prospect of more coming to him. He had been shot—possibly by accident, perhaps by intention. And who could have shot him but Sylvie? And where was Sylvie—and where was Sophie Guyner? And how had Werrick come there? But the last question was unimportant; the really pertinent fact was that Sydney Werrick was there—dead.

Carsdale took a hurried look around him. There was nothing in the appearance of the dining-room to show that there had been any struggle, any disturbance. He went back into the drawing-room; everything there was in order, too. And now, having got over his fright, he went up to the body and examined without touching it. Except for a slight frown which had puckered the forehead between the eyes and parted the lips a little, the face was calm; Carsdale judged from that that death had been instantaneous. The hands were gripping the clothing about the chest; looking more closely, Carsdale saw a single spot of blood that had oozed out through the under-clothing and the shirt to the fancy waistcoat and had spread a little over the light material. He knew then that Werrick had been shot through the heart, probably as he crossed the threshold between the two rooms, and that he must have spun around, clutching at his breast, and have fallen dead in the attitude in which he then lay.

Carsdale stepped carefully over the dead man and entered the bedroom. That, as it faced some high building at the rear of the flats, was in greater gloom than the drawing-room. He switched on the electric light and looked about him before going further. There were traces of recent occupancy there. On the bed were thrown a coat and skirt which he recognized as Sylvie’s; he had seen her in them only a day or two before, noticing them particularly because they were new. Near them, also on the bed, lay a hat which he knew as hers—it had evidently been thrown down in haste, as had also the walking costume. Carsdale argued a good deal from the appearance of these things; he knew Sylvie to be tidy, orderly, and careful of her clothes and hats to a fault, and he realized that she must have been in desperate haste to be gone when she flung her gown and hat aside in that fashion. If it were she who had shot Werrick, he said to himself, then she had changed her attire afterwards, hurrying to get away from the dead man, and the scene of his death.

Going further into the room, Carsdale saw that the small safe which Sylvie had had built into the wall, was open. He saw papers and books lying inside; one of the two drawers was pulled out and was left unshut and empty. Within the safe lay a satin-lined jewel case, also empty.

“Collected her money and her jewels and hurried off,” muttered Carsdale. “And she can’t have been gone many minutes when I came.”

He turned to the dressing-table, still prying and examining. And suddenly his eyes caught sight of the revolver, a toy weapon which he himself had given to Sylvie, a year or two before, when there had been burglars in the flats, and she had expressed a fear of them. It lay on the edge of the dressing-table, as if she had dropped it there as soon as the fatal shot was fired. He picked it up and examined it. One chamber had been discharged; the others were still loaded.

As Carsdale stood, handling the revolver, and wondering what he was to do next, he heard the outer door of the flat open, a light footstep in the hall, and then in the dining-room. He stood waiting; then, still unconsciously holding the revolver, stepped towards the door. He heard the footstep again; the next instant he found himself standing on one side of the dead body, and saw, confronting him from the other, Sophie Guyner.

It seemed to Carsdale a whole eternity before the maid spoke. Her eyes went from him to the dead man; from the dead man to him; back to the dead man. She leaned forward trembling violently; it seemed to him that the mere glare of her frightened eyes was potent enough to call life back to the lifeless limbs. Slowly she raised her head, shrank back, and stared at Carsdale.

“It’s—it’s Syd!” she gasped. “He’s—dead. You’ve killed him! Oh! Oh!”

Carsdale saw what was coming and made a half-step towards her.

“Hold your tongue!” he said in a fierce whisper. “Don’t you see——”

Sophie backed away from him; suddenly all control went out of her. She turned and darted through the door and the corridor rang with her shrieks. “Help! Murder! Help!”

“Come back, you hell cat!” shouted Carsdale, leaping after and trying to clutch her. “Come back! You’ll have the whole——”

But already doors were opening on either side, and a uniformed official was running towards Sophie from the head of the stairs, while the lift, just then passing, came to a sudden stop, and excited faces looked out of its barred door. The ugly cry seemed to be taken up all round—the very walls seemed to echo it.

Carsdale uttered a hearty and fervent curse, and, re-entering the flat, swallowed some more brandy. Then he suddenly remembered that he was holding the revolver in his left hand, and he went back and laid it on the dressing-table, just where he had found it. As he stepped over the dead man again, Sophie Guyner and a porter in uniform, and a lift-boy, and a couple of policemen came pouring in, and beyond them, at the outer door, Carsdale saw a crowd of eager and excited faces.

Sophie stretched out an accusing finger.

“That’s him!” she shouted. “I found him standing over him with the revolver, smoking in his hand. Oh, see if he’s really dead!”

One policeman stooped and examined the dead body; the other looked at Carsdale. And Carsdale shook his head.

“Take no notice of what that woman says,” he said. “She knows nothing about it. I came in here a few minutes ago, and found this man lying dead here. I was just coming out to raise an alarm when she came in.”

“There’ll be an inspector and a doctor here in a minute,” said the policeman. “You’d better tell the inspector. Is he dead, Jim?”

The second policeman got up and straightened himself.

“Been dead half an hour, I should say,” he answered laconically. “So I don’t think you saw any smoking revolver,” he added grimly, turning to Sophie. “Keep quiet, now; no row. Move away from there, ladies and gentlemen, if you please.”

Carsdale leaned against the edge of the table and waited in silence until the inspector and the police-surgeon came hurrying in. The policemen, having turned everybody else out, also waited in silence, watching Carsdale. As for Sophie Guyner, she had sunk into a chair near the dead man, and was sobbing and moaning inarticulately. And Carsdale, watching her, began to form an idea that there might be matters connected with this death of Werrick of which he as yet knew nothing.

The police-surgeon said exactly what the policeman had said—that Werrick must have been dead half an hour, at least; the inspector, having heard, in silence, what his men had to say, turned to Carsdale, looking him over inquiringly and noting his appearance.

“What do you know about this, sir?” he asked. “I understand you were here when this was discovered. You needn’t say more than you wish to say, you know.”

“I’ll say all that I know, readily,” answered Carsdale. He had been thinking everything over, and had made up his mind to tell the whole plain truth, for his own sake. He knew by that time that all his plans were broken in upon, if not destroyed; he would have to reconstruct everything, and he was not going to be incriminated, even for Sylvie’s sake. “It’s a simple story, so far as I am concerned.”

“You’ve shot him—you know you’ve shot him!” cried Sophie, suddenly waking into vicious energy. “One of you’ve shot him, at any rate.”

“Be quiet!” said the inspector. “Now sir—what is it?”

“I’ll tell you the plain facts,” answered Carsdale. “This flat is tenanted by a lady who is my cousin and my secretary—there’s my card, inspector. The lady’s name is Mrs. Walsingham. That woman, Sophie Guyner, is her maid. I have a key to the flat—here it is. I came here about twenty or twenty-five minutes ago to call on my cousin, and I let myself in. I heard nothing and saw no one in the hall or the dining-room, so I stepped in here. The electric light wasn’t on then. I found this body lying where you see it—it hasn’t been touched. The man was dead, then. I looked round the place—in the bedroom, there, I found a revolver, of which one chamber had been discharged—it’s in there now. I was examining it when this woman came in and at once went off screaming murder. That’s all I know.”

“Do you know the man?” asked the inspector.

“I do,” replied Carsdale promptly. “He is Sydney Werrick, and he has been living with me at my rooms in Jermyn Street for several days. And he is, in fact, the husband of my cousin. She goes under the name of Mrs. Walsingham, but she is, in fact, Mrs. Werrick.”

“Yes, and she and him,” exclaimed Sophie Guyner, excitedly, “she and him have always been against Sydney, and I can see what it is—they’ve got him here and shot him, and——”

“Will you keep quiet, now?” said the inspector. He stepped into the bedroom, looked around him, and came back with the revolver. “This cousin of yours,” he asked, turning to Carsdale, “where is she?”

“I don’t know,” replied Carsdale, firmly. “I have not seen her to-day at all. I came here, expecting to find her in. There was no one in.”

The inspector turned to Sophie.

“Do you know where your mistress is?” he asked.

But Sophie shook her head and again pointed viciously at Carsdale.

“Ask him!” she said loudly. “I tell you it’s all a plant. I expect they got him here and shot him—I know they wanted to get rid of him. She got me out of the way—she sent me off to the theatre, and I only happened to come back because I wasn’t well. Shot him?—of course they’ve done it! I tell you they wanted to get rid of him—he’s been dangerous to them ever since they ran away from New York and left him to go to prison for what they did. I can tell you a lot about the whole thing, I’ll warrant you.”

“That,” said the inspector dryly, “seems very evident. However, you must tell it at the station, for you’ll have to go round there. And you, too,” he continued, turning to Carsdale.

“You don’t mean to say that you attach any importance to what this foolish woman says?” said Carsdale. “Surely you must see——”

“I see that we shall want to know a good deal more before we can let either of you out of our sight,” answered the inspector. “It’s no good arguing—you’ll have to come along.”

And so the watchers outside saw Carsdale taken off by the police, and presently the tidings of the murder spread out to them and to the world at large.

CHAPTER XXXII
SLEUTH HOUNDS

Carsdale went to the police-station readily enough. He knew that his policy in this unforeseen matter was to play the straightest game possible. He could do no more for Sylvie; she, by shooting Werrick, with whatever object, had done for herself. Now he must look after himself, and the only way to do it was to tell plain truth. And he told all he knew, frankly and unreservedly, to the authorities at the station, and to a pleasant-looking man, who in appearance was something between a country gentleman and a sporting publican, and whom Carsdale quickly found to be the celebrated Detective-Inspector Skarratt, from New Scotland Yard, famous for his skill in unravelling mysteries, and just arrived, hot-foot, and prepared to begin the unravelling of another.

The men who listened to Carsdale’s story of how he came to be in the flat believed it. Nevertheless, there were questions arising out of it, and as their present proceedings were informal, they asked them.

“What about what this maid says?” asked the police-inspector who had first come to the scene. “She referred to some doings in New York.”

Carsdale had no objection to telling all about that—he had already reflected that it would all come out, sooner or later, and he might just as well be first in the field with his version.

“I’ll tell you everything in connection with that affair,” he said. “It brings no discredit on anybody except the dead man, Werrick. My cousin—the lady in whose flat I found the body just now—married this man when they were little more than boy and girl. He had some money—so had she. They very soon got through it—extravagance, and that sort of thing. Then they were on their beam-ends, for they had no relations or friends who could help them. At that time I was starting a business in New York, and I got them over there to help me—really to provide for them. She turned out a smart business woman; he got mixed up with a lot of gamblers, and we had great trouble with him. Finally the police laid hold of him—that’s what the maid, Guyner, was referring to.”

“What charge?” asked the police-inspector.

“Forgery,” answered Carsdale, promptly. “He was an expert forger—he forged my name more than once, and I forgave him for his wife’s sake. Well, he got five years. Just then I transferred my business to London, and I brought my cousin back with me. I soon went into partnership with the late Mr. Barclay Leverton, of Norfolk Street, and my cousin became our private secretary. Most City folk knew our firm—Leverton & Carsdale—and know me now. After Leverton died I kept the offices on—go down to Abbotsbury House, and you’ll find that I have the top floor, the whole of it. My cousin, of course, remained with me. We had heard that this man, her husband, had been released from prison in America, and had gone out West. Not long since we heard that he was dead—shot in some brawl in a mining town. That turned out to be false. One night, quite recently, I met him by accident in the Strand. He was down on his luck, of course; nearly broke. I took him home to my rooms in Jermyn Street, and put him up there. I made him promise that he wouldn’t molest his wife, and I promised him that I’d get him up again if he kept his promise to me. I gave him a hundred pounds to fit himself out and for pocket money, and up to now he’s behaved himself. How he came to be in that flat, I can’t think. My impression is that he watched the maid out, followed his wife in, and that she shot him in mistake or self-defence—she was always frightened about burglars, ever since there was a burglary in a flat close by. That’s all I can guess, and all I can tell you.”

“You saw nothing of her when you entered?” asked Skarratt, speaking for the first time.

“Nothing. I haven’t seen her since last night, when she left Norfolk Street,” replied Carsdale. “I have been out of my office all day to-day—at least since eleven o’clock this morning. I know she had been in then, and gone out again. My people there can tell you about her movements, but they won’t be there until ten o’clock to-morrow.”

“You’d better give me a description of her,” said the police-inspector.

Carsdale gave a full and elaborate description of Sylvie—again he said to himself that it was no use keeping anything back. If he didn’t describe her, somebody else would.

Skarratt waited until the description was finished. Then, after a word or two with the inspector-in-charge, he went out. The inspector turned to Carsdale. “I’m afraid we shall have to detain you awhile at any rate,” he said. “It can’t be helped.”

“I suppose not,” answered Carsdale. “I quite understand.”

And he resigned himself to waiting and to wondering what really had happened in the flat before he got there, and where Sylvie had fled to, and how she had got away. His head ached with the mystery of the whole affair.

Meanwhile, Skarratt went away to the flats, and patiently made himself master of the details. He quickly found out that there were two entrances to the building, and that the porters on each had been on duty during the whole of the evening. Within a few minutes he elicited from them certain important facts:—

1. One porter, stationed at Entrance A, had seen Mrs. Walsingham enter the building about a quarter to eight o’clock. She was then wearing the costume which he was shown lying on the bed in her room.

2. The other porter, stationed at Entrance B, recognized the dead man as having entered the building about twenty-five minutes to eight. He had inquired his way to Number 29—which was the number of Mrs. Walsingham’s flat.

3. This porter had seen Sophie Guyner go out through his entrance at seven o’clock. She had then told him that she was going to the theatre. A little after eight o’clock she had returned, and had told him that she had such a bad attack of headache that she had been obliged to return home.

4. Neither porter had seen Mrs. Walsingham leave the flats during the evening. Of that they were positive. Certainly, a large number of people were perpetually passing in and out, but each man knew Mrs. Walsingham so well that he was positive that she had not gone out again after her coming in at Entrance A.

5. The porter at Entrance B remembered Carsdale coming in very well indeed, because Carsdale, as he often did, had presented him with a cigar. That would be just about eight o’clock.

6. In one of the dead man’s pockets Skarratt found a key which admitted to the outer door of the flat. It was newly made, and looked as if it had never been used.

Skarratt, who by that time had summoned an assistant from New Scotland Yard, examined surface matters at the flat quickly but thoroughly. He particularly noted the condition of the bedroom—the revolver, of which he now took charge; the unclosed safe, with its open drawer; the hat and garments hastily thrown on the bed.

“Where is that maid?” he asked of the police who had remained in charge of the flat.

Sophie was in the dining-room, crying—on her, too, a policeman was keeping an eye. At his bidding she came into the bedroom, glancing fearfully, as she passed through the drawing-room, at Werrick’s body, which had now been laid out on a sofa and covered with a sheet in readiness for removal to the mortuary. She looked at Inspector Skarratt’s friendly and good-humoured face with a queer mixture of shrewdness and suspicion and defiance.

“Now, my dear,” said Skarratt, “I want a little help from you. As you’re Mrs. Walsingham’s maid, you, of course, know all her gowns and dresses?”

“Every one,” answered Sophie. “Every stitch she has!”

“Then just look round here and tell me which costume, or gown, or dress, or whatever she wears for going out, is missing,” said Skarratt. “Be particular—don’t forget anything.”

Sophie entered on this task with zest, she opened wardrobes, she threw back the doors of cupboards, she examined drawers and trunks. And finally she turned to Skarratt with undisguised amazement.

“There’s nothing missing!” she exclaimed. “There’s every gown that she has, here.”

“Oh, come, come!” said Skarratt. “That can’t be. You’ve forgotten something. She can’t have left the flat without some gown or other, you know.”

“I don’t know what she’s gone in, then,” said Sophie. “I know every stitch she has, I tell you, and here’s everything here. There’s the coat and skirt and hat she had on this morning,” she continued, pointing to the bed, “and you can see for yourself that she’s taken them off in a hurry and thrown them there.”

“I can see it, and I want to know what she put on in their place,” answered Skarratt. “Come now—there’s a pretty big wardrobe here, you know—twenty-five different gowns, at least. Don’t you think you’ve forgotten one?”

“I’ve forgotten nothing,” said Sophie, doggedly. “I know every gown she has.”

“Well, has she gone out in anything of your own, then?” suggested Skarratt. “Go and see if you miss anything.”

Sophie went off, still police-attended, but suddenly returned excited and glowing.

“I know!” she exclaimed. “I’ve just remembered. She’d a complete nun’s dress—a Sister of Mercy’s, you know—all black, with white hood, and all that—that she went to a fancy-dress ball in once, with Carsdale. She’ll have gone in that. That’s it!”

“Probably,” said Skarratt. He took down such details as Sophie could remember, and then, with his assistants, went off to see the two porters. The man at Entrance A had no recollection of seeing any woman dressed as a nun or a Sister of Mercy enter or leave, the man at Entrance B had a dim notion that such a figure did either go in or out during the evening. But both men pointed out that it was no uncommon thing at all for nuns and Sisters of Mercy to visit the flats—some had relations or friends there; some came in cases of sickness; some came begging for charity. And both men reminded him that they had come on duty at seven o’clock—they could not say who had gone in before that, and they were not very clear as to particular persons who had left or entered after. But each agreed that Mrs. Walsingham in her own clothes was always noticeable. “She was a stylish dresser you see,” added one.

Skarratt sent his man off with some instructions. If Mrs. Walsingham had escaped in the disguise of a nun, they would have to keep a wide look-out, and they must especially watch the railway stations and the docks. But they had a clue now, and a good one.

He was turning away from the entrance at which he had been talking to one of the porters, when he heard his name called, and turning, saw Miss Norshaw, the principal of the private detective agency which Frances Leverton had employed. Skarratt had more than once been brought into touch with this lady, and he immediately joined her, guessing that she had something to tell him. They walked away down the street.

“I’ve heard something of this case, Mr. Skarratt,” said Miss Norshaw. “And I’ve some information that may be useful to you. You’re detaining a man named Carsdale, aren’t you! Yes—well, we’ve had that man under observation for the last two days on the instructions of a client of ours, and I have a strong suspicion, from to-day’s reports, that he was going to leave the country to-night. Now, you’ve done me a good turn more than once, and I’ll do you one—I’ll just run over Carsdale’s movements to-day, briefly.”

Skarratt listened eagerly to all that Miss Norshaw had to tell him. When she had finished, he jumped into a taxi-cab and went down to Long Acre to the motor-garage where Carsdale had been seen to leave his portmanteaux. He was not long in there, and when he came out he drove back to the police-station and had a talk to the inspector-in-charge. And presently they went in to see Carsdale.

“Now, Mr. Carsdale,” said Skarratt, in the cheery and breezy manner which characterized him in his professional dealings, “I’m afraid you’re in a very unpleasant position. I’m not going to charge you with anything just now, but I’m afraid I may have to, later on. In the meantime, will you turn out whatever you have on you in the way of papers, documents, money? It will be best for you if you do, and if you don’t—well, you don’t want to be searched, anyway.”

And Carsdale once more determined to resign himself to the straight course, believing that he could give a good and plausible reason for the presence of the things he would have to show. And so it came about that the two officers were presently examining certain matters which represented two hundred thousand pounds and were noting that Carsdale carried two first-class tickets for Buenos Aires by the steamer which was to leave Southampton next morning.

CHAPTER XXXIII
SANCTUARY

For once in a way the newspaper men had got a murder case in which there was very little mystery. Carsdale had spoken the truth so freely, Sophie Guyner had treated everybody to her mind on the matter with such abandon, that there was opportunity for the writing of columns of plain narrative. And, departing from their usual modes of procedure, the police had kept nothing back, had, rather, given the reporters every information they could and every facility for obtaining more. This was on Inspector Skarratt’s initiative—it had readily occurred to him that no good could be done by concealment, for the one thing that was important was to find the lady who called herself Mrs. Walsingham, and was in reality Mrs. Sylvie Werrick. Therefore, argued Skarratt, use the press as a medium; circulate the whole story as widely and as circumstantially as possible; everybody, from idlers to errand boys, will then be on the outlook for a woman in a nun’s dress, and it will be a wonder if an arrest does not speedily follow. The newspaper men blessed Skarratt, and every paper came out with as much stuff about the Bloomsbury Mystery as ever perspiring sub-editors and worried foremen could cram into it.

Richard Shrewsbury, breakfasting with Burgoyne in a private room at the Charing Cross Hotel, read the first news before his friend came in; Burgoyne, when he entered, found him trembling with excitement. He thrust the paper into Burgoyne’s hands.

“She—she was married!” he cried. “Married, all the time! And—they say she’s shot her husband. Look!”

“What are you raving about?” asked Burgoyne, taking the paper and seeing the headlines. “Steady, man!”

“Steady enough,” retorted Richard. “I’m talking about—Sylvie. See there—she was married to a fellow named Werrick—and they say she’s shot him—murdered him. Good God!—what a lot seems to be happening! I’m going out to get some more papers—there may be something with later news. Read it—read it all!”

Burgoyne sat down and read steadily. The newspaper which Richard had thrust upon him had favoured its readers with a résumé of the matter, and had printed it in large type; within a few minutes, therefore, Burgoyne was in full possession of the outstanding facts.

This is what he read:—

A tragedy, which still has certain elements of mystery about it, occurred about eight o’clock last evening at a flat in Marengo Mansions, Bloomsbury.

The flat, Number 29, has for some time—nearly three years, it is understood—been tenanted by a lady known as Mrs. Walsingham, who lived there with a maid named Sophie Guyner. Mrs. Walsingham, who appears to have been comfortably off, judging from the appearance of her rooms and from her general style of living, was engaged in financial work, and had for some time acted as secretary to the firm of Leverton & Carsdale, general agents, of Abbotsbury House, Norfolk Street, Strand. The senior partner died recently, and the business was then carried on by Mr. John Carsdale, Mrs. Walsingham retaining her secretaryship.

Yesterday afternoon, Mrs. Walsingham telephoned to her maid, Sophie Guyner, from the City, saying that she was sending her two tickets for the Hyperion Theatre for last night, and that she herself should not be home until very late. The tickets duly arrived by the hands of Griffkin, the office-boy at Mr. Carsdale’s offices, and Guyner proceeded to the theatre with a friend. She—Guyner—was not feeling very well, however, and almost as soon as the performance began, she was obliged to leave the theatre and to go home.

Upon entering the flat, Guyner was horrified to find the body of a man lying across the threshold of her mistress’s bedroom, apparently dead. On the other side of it, and in the bedroom, she saw Mr. John Carsdale, holding a revolver in his hand, which, Guyner alleges, was still smoking. [This latter fact the police do not credit for a moment, as it has been abundantly proved that at the time of Guyner’s entrance the man had been dead quite half an hour, and only one chamber of the revolver had been discharged.]

Guyner immediately raised an alarm, and some of the porters of the building, together with the police, were quickly on the scene. It was then found that the man had been shot through the heart, and that death must have been instantaneous. To the police, Mr. John Carsdale at once gave a full and unreserved account of his presence at the flat. He explained that Mrs. Walsingham was his cousin, and that she was really the wife of the man whose body lay before them, and whose name was Sydney Werrick. According to Mr. Carsdale, Werrick had been convicted of forgery in New York and sent to prison there; since his release he had lived in America. Recently he had turned up in London, and had been befriended by Mr. Carsdale on the condition that he should not molest his wife.

Mr. Carsdale’s theory is that Werrick by some means obtained an entrance to the flat yesterday evening when Mrs. Walsingham (Werrick) was alone, and that she shot him in self-defence or on the spur of the moment. There had recently been a burglary at Marengo Mansions, and she had been very much alarmed about it, and Mr. Carsdale had brought her the revolver with which Werrick undoubtedly had been shot.

Mr. Carsdale says that he entered the flat—to which he had a private key—a little after eight o’clock last night, and that there was no living person in it. He at once discovered the body of the dead man, and he had just picked up the revolver, and was examining it, when the maid, Sophie Guyner, returned.

An examination of the flat and of Mrs. Walsingham’s (Werrick’s) belongings show that she must have gone away from Marengo Mansions wearing the dress of a nun, a full description of which will be found below. Up to a late hour last night, no trace of her had been met with. It is believed that she will endeavour to escape to the Continent, and the cross-Channel boats will be closely watched at the various ports this morning, as also will all railway stations.

In consequence of certain facts not yet made public, Mr. John Carsdale has been detained by the police authorities.

Burgoyne had just finished reading this condensed narrative, when Richard burst into the room with an armful of newspapers.

“Have you read that?” he demanded, excitedly. “Have you read it? Have you ever read anything like it? To trick me like that!—And Carsdale knew all the time!”

“Keep cool, Dick,” said Burgoyne. “It’s no use getting excited—we shall want all our wits. There’s one thing I can see very plainly already.”

“What?” demanded Richard, who was feverishly turning over his bundle of papers. “What?”

“That my diamond necklace has probably vanished with the woman,” answered Burgoyne grimly. “She wouldn’t be very likely to leave that behind her. And whether she meant to shoot her husband or not, I should say that as she knew he was in London she was probably preparing for flight. I suppose she hadn’t any property of yours, Dick, beyond what you’d given her?”

“No,” answered Richard. “Except that I gave her a blank cheque the other day which she was to fill up.”

Burgoyne whistled.

“By Jove!” he said. “Well, you can soon find out what’s happened to that by telephoning to the bank as soon as it’s open. Of course, if Carsdale knew that the husband was in town, he would tell her. I should say she meant to be off. And in that case, she would feather her nest. I dare say the man tried to stop her. Then she shot him, and——”

Richard suddenly uttered a sharp exclamation.

“Listen!” he said. “Here’s some more in a late morning edition. It’s about Carsdale.

“We understand that, in consequence of certain information supplied to them last night, the police have formally arrested the Norfolk Street financial agent, John Carsdale, on a charge of being concerned in the death of Sydney Werrick at Mrs. Walsingham’s or Werrick’s flat in Marengo Mansions, Bloomsbury.

“It is said that upon Carsdale there were found certain securities valued at two hundred thousand pounds, and that he was also in possession of two first-class tickets for passage to Buenos Aires, available by the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company’s steamer which leaves Southampton this morning. It appears that Carsdale had chartered a motor-car from a well-known firm in Long Acre, and had ordered it to be in readiness for him at a certain hour last night, and the theory of the police now is that he and Mrs. Walsingham intended to leave the country in this way; that he went to her flat to fetch her, and that Werrick interrupted their final preparations, with the fatal result now known. It should, however, be pointed out in relation to this, that there seems no reason why Carsdale should not have escaped as readily as Mrs. Walsingham, or Werrick, did, and that the police-surgeon who was on the spot within a few minutes of Carsdale’s being found in the flat is positive that Werrick had then been dead half an hour.

“According to our information, the securities found upon Carsdale are probably the property of a young gentleman of fortune, for whom he seems to have recently acted as financial agent, and who is, we learn, at present travelling on the Continent.

“Up to the hour of going to press, no news had been heard of Mrs. Walsingham, for whom a strict look-out is being kept at all railway stations and ports.”

“Dick,” said Burgoyne. “You must be down at your bankers as soon as ever their doors open. That’ll be nine o’clock. Come, let’s breakfast, and then to business. We are back on the very nick of time.”

“You think that Carsdale’s robbed me?” said Richard quietly.

“What does it look like?” asked Burgoyne. “You must make sure. I’ll drive down with you.”

They were in the City before the clocks began to chime nine, and within the bank before the chimes had finished. The manager seemed in no wise surprised to see Richard; he had read the papers on his way from home. He began to answer Richard’s question before it was completely voiced.

“Mr. Carsdale was here yesterday, Mr. Shrewsbury,” he answered. “He saw the two principals. He produced to them a written order from you authorizing them to deliver up whatever securities of yours we held. He selected two hundred thousand pounds’ worth. I was present. He said that he was going to re-invest on your behalf. Of course, he gave a receipt. Wasn’t your order a genuine one? The signature looked all right.”

“I signed some papers the other day without knowing what I signed,” replied Richard, bitterly. “I trusted him fully, as you know.”

The manager looked at Burgoyne, and shook his head. He turned to Richard again.

“There’s another matter I may mention,” he said. “The—er—lady who figures in these newspaper reports this morning cashed a cheque of yours here yesterday afternoon, not so very long after Carsdale had been here. It was for fifteen thousand pounds. Was that in order?”

“That’s all right,” answered Richard. He took an unceremonious leave, and went out. Burgoyne followed him.

“Look here, Dick,” he said. “Let’s go down to Blair—he’ll advise. Come along!”

“No!” replied Richard. “I’m going home—there’s something I want to look into. You go to Blair, if you like.”

“Then I shall bring him along to Berkeley Square,” said Burgoyne. “We want advice, I tell you.”

Richard nodded, and got into a taxi-cab. He drove West in a whirl of thoughts and emotions; his world seemed to have been turned upside down. At that moment he forgot even Burgoyne’s devotion.

Kedgin met him at his own door. And Kedgin, usually the most self-possessed of men, heaved a great sigh of relief when he saw his master.

“Oh, sir!” he exclaimed. “I’m—I’m thankful you’ve come home, sir!—I haven’t known what to do—I daren’t telephone to Paris. Sir—Mrs. Walsingham’s here—she’s been here since last night!”

CHAPTER XXXIV
KNIGHT-ERRANT

Of all the eventualities which might spring out of the affair which was just then monopolizing all his thought, this was the last of which Richard would ever have dreamed. He stood in the hall of the flat staring at Kedgin as if the man had given him unbelievable news. It was only with difficulty that he brought his mind round to an accurate comprehension of what Kedgin meant.

“Here?” he said at last. “Here?”

Kedgin coughed behind an uplifted and trembling hand.

“Yes-es, sir—here,” he answered. “In the—the smaller bedroom, sir. I—I haven’t seen the lady this morning. But—I know she’s there, sir.”

Richard continued to stare at his servant. He was not looking at Kedgin, however—he was seeing probabilities and possibilities.

“If—if you would kindly step inside, sir,” suggested Kedgin, diffidently, “I would tell you all about it, sir. The fact is, sir, I am thoroughly upset—especially since I read the newspapers this morning, sir, which I dare say you have seen?”

“I’ve seen them,” answered Richard. He walked into the dining-room, motioning Kedgin to follow him. “Tell me all about it,” he said. “Sit down, man—and help yourself to a drop of brandy first—why, you’re trembling like a leaf! Here—I’ll give you some.”

“I’m very sorry, sir—it’s weak of me, no doubt,” said Kedgin, taking the glass which Richard handed him, “but I’ve been that frightened. You see, sir, I didn’t know what to do—and I couldn’t help thinking that—that Mrs. Walsingham, sir, had gone—mad, sir!”

“Mad?” exclaimed Richard. “Why?”

“General behaviour, sir,” replied Kedgin. He sipped at the brandy, and shook his head. “I never got a wink of sleep all night, sir,” he continued. “You see, sir, my wife is away just now, as perhaps you remember, so I’d nobody to talk to about—about this. And then, when I got the newspapers this morning, of course, I was worse alarmed than ever. It gave me quite a shock, sir, when I heard your key in the latch.”

“Well, I’m here, now,” said Richard. “Tell me how Mrs. Walsingham came here. When was it?”

“It was last night, sir,” answered Kedgin. “It must have been about ten o’clock. It was dark, anyhow. As I said, my wife is away, so I was getting a bit of supper alone. Most of the doors were open—I’d left them open because it was a close night and I wanted to air the rooms. I heard a latch-key in the outer door; then I heard somebody come in, very light of foot, sir. I knew it wasn’t either you or the Captain, sir, because of that. Whoever it was, walked into the drawing-room, and, of course, I followed. And you could have knocked me down, sir, when I saw a nun standing there—all black, sir—it gave me a real turn!”

“Well?” said Richard.

“Then, sir, it spoke,” continued Kedgin, “and I recognized Mrs. Walsingham’s voice. ‘Well, Kedgin,’ she says, ‘did you think I was a ghost?’ ‘Well, ma’am,’ I says, ‘you gave me a fright.’ ‘Then you can give me a brandy-and-soda, Kedgin,’ she says. ‘That’ll be a fair exchange,’ and she laughed in a very queer way, sir. ‘It’ll look odd to see a nun drinking brandy-and-soda,’ she says; ‘but never mind—there’s nobody but you to see, Kedgin.’ ‘No, ma’am,’ I says, and I went to get her what she wanted; but first, I turned the light on. And then I was more frightened than ever, sir, for she was nearly as white as the white thing about her face, and her eyes glowed like coals, and she smiled at me—it makes me queer to think of it, sir!”

“Then don’t think of it. Go on with your story,” said Richard.

“Well, sir, I got her what she wanted,” said Kedgin, “and she sat down there and drank it, but she didn’t say anything for some time, though I waited about wondering what she was after. And at last she says—‘Kedgin,’ she says, ‘Mr. Shrewsbury and Mr. Burgoyne are in Paris, aren’t they?’ she says. ‘They are, Mrs. Walsingham,’ I says. ‘Then,’ says she, ‘I’m going to stay here all night. It’s no use talking to me about it,’ she says, ‘nor asking me any questions about it,’ she says. ‘I’m dead tired out,’ she says, ‘and I’m going to have the small room.’ And she walked straight over to it, sir, and opened the door, and looked in, and then she looked back at me and put her hand in her bag, and brought out something and threw it on the table. ‘I don’t know whether your wife is in or not, Kedgin,’ she says, ‘but if she is, there’s something for both of you. Only hold your tongues until morning, and don’t disturb me for—anything,’ she says, giving me a queer look. ‘I’m dead beat,’ she says. And with that, sir, she went into that room, and locked the door, and out of it she hasn’t been since. And, of course, sir,” concluded Kedgin, looking fearfully at the closed door, “of course, I read the newspaper this morning, and then I knew what had happened.”

“You’ve not seen nor heard of her since she went in there?” asked Richard.

“Neither sight nor sound, sir,” replied Kedgin. “I was getting uncommonly afraid when you came. You—you don’t think she’s—made away with herself, sir, do you?”

Richard started at the suggestion. After all, it was possible. In spite of the deception which she had practised on him, he believed that he knew something of Sylvie, and he thought her not unlikely, if forced into a tight corner, to end everything by ending her own life.

“I hope not, Kedgin!” he said anxiously. “You say you’ve heard nothing of her this morning?”

“Nothing, sir. I’ve been in and out since—oh, since a very early hour, and I’ve heard not a sound,” answered Kedgin. “I thought, sir, as how she might have taken some of those sleeping things—there’s a good many ladies does, nowadays.”

“Of course, nobody knows that she’s here?” said Richard.

“So far as I know, sir,” replied Kedgin. “It was dark when she came. She may have slipped in unobserved. I’ve been down to the door twice this morning, and the porter hasn’t mentioned it. About the time she came in he goes off to get his supper, as a rule, so he probably wasn’t there, sir.”

“Well, we’ll wait a little,” said Richard. Then he remembered that Burgoyne had spoken of bringing Blair to the flat. “They mustn’t come at present,” he thought, and he went to the telephone and rang Blair up. Burgoyne, he found, had just arrived at Blair’s rooms—he invented an excuse for putting them off coming round to Berkeley Square and made an appointment to meet them at lunch later on. And this done, he went back to Kedgin, and incidentally looking at his watch, saw that it was ten o’clock.

“I’ll knock at the door, Kedgin,” he said. “I don’t like to think there’s anything wrong, but surely she can’t be sleeping—at least, naturally—all this time.”

There was no response to Richard’s first summons, and a second and louder knock also produced no answer. And then, just as Richard was beginning to be seriously concerned, and Kedgin was hinting at the probable necessity of breaking into the room, the door suddenly opened and Mrs. Walsingham confronted them.

She was still in the nun’s garments in which she had escaped from her flat, and their sombre hue made her white face look all the whiter. But Richard drew back from her not so much in surprise at her white face as at the change which had come over her since he had last seen her. She seemed to have been suddenly transformed into a worn and haggard woman of uncertain age. There was no colour in her cheeks now; the sparkle had gone out of her eyes; her lips were almost bloodless; about her mouth were heavy wrinkles. She seemed altogether transformed, and, as he gazed at her, Richard found himself wondering that a human being could be so suddenly changed.

For a moment the three stared at each other in a painful silence; then the woman pointed to Kedgin.

“Go away,” she said. “I want to speak to your master.”

Kedgin, at a nod from Richard, went out, and Mrs. Walsingham came into the dining-room and sat down, with a weary gesture. She looked at Richard out of dull eyes; never had he seen her so apathetic, so listless, before. And when she spoke he was astonished at the altered tone of her voice—she spoke as if she had no energy left in her.

“I had a sort of notion that it might be you,” she said, gazing at him as she might have gazed at some inanimate object. “I suppose you were surprised to hear that I was in the place. But I’d nowhere to go—I couldn’t get out of London last night. Perhaps I shan’t be able to get out this morning. I don’t know what may be known. And I’m forgetting—I don’t know whether you know anything.”

There was a copy of a morning newspaper lying on the table by which she was sitting, and Richard silently pointed her to it. She drew it towards her and looked at the big letters which ran across the top of half a page. Even then her listlessness and apathy never seemed to leave her; she read without seeming interest, and Richard, watching her narrowly, looked in vain for any sign of excitement or fear or, indeed, of any emotion.

“Yes,” she said presently, as if in comment on what she read, “but Carsdale hadn’t anything to do with it. I didn’t know Carsdale was coming. I expect you’ve read all that?—it seems to have been found out very soon,” she continued, turning to Richard.

“I have read it,” he answered.

“It’s quite true I shot Werrick,” she said. “I shot him on the spur of the moment—I fired at him as soon as I saw his face. Well—and I don’t wonder that I did. Last night I felt keen about getting away—I thought I could from here. But this morning I feel—I don’t know. I suppose I had better give myself up. I’m beaten. I’m tired. I had to take a sleeping-draught last night. Perhaps it hasn’t worn off. Will you give me some tea?”

Richard hastily gave Kedgin an order and went back to the dining-room. She was bending over the newspaper again—it was that in which he had seen the later news of the discovery of the securities and the tickets for Buenos Aires on Carsdale. She looked up, tapping the paragraph.

“What’s this mean?” she said. “I don’t know anything about that. Carsdale must have been on his way to ask me to go with him. What a muddle! But I didn’t know. Two hundred thousand! That would be your money. I’ve got a lot of that, too. Never mind—you’ll get it back, because I don’t think I shall get away, now.”

“What are you going to do—what am I to do for you?” asked Richard. “We must do something. Tell me—what were you going to do?”

She looked at him out of dull eyes for a few seconds as if she did not comprehend his question. He repeated it.

“Yes,” she answered suddenly. “I was going to Vienna. Now I remember. I made arrangements about transferring money to Vienna at the Anglo-Austrian Bank. Yes—Vienna. I should have got on there.”

Kedgin came in with the tea. She glanced at him sharply.

“Give me some brandy in it,” she said.

Richard moved uneasily, but Kedgin, with a meaning glance at his master, poured a liberal dose of brandy into the cup before he handed it to her. And at the first sip Richard saw her eyes brighten and more intelligence come into her face. She looked at him with a strange, doubtful glance.

“You see, I hadn’t anywhere to turn to but—this,” she said. “I knew I should be safe here for the night—I managed to slip in unobserved. I—I suppose I shall have to give myself up now, though.”

“I wish I knew what to do!” groaned Richard. “Can’t—can’t we think of some way of getting you out of the country?”

She looked down at her clinging garments.

“What—in these?” she said. “Not very likely.”

“But—in some other way?” he suggested. “Come—think!”

She looked at him dully, and shook her head.

“I can’t,” she said. “I’m tired out. You don’t understand—nobody could understand. It’s the—the strain. I feel as if I didn’t want anything but—to sleep.”

Then she suddenly drank off the tea and, with another strange look at Richard, went into the room in which she had passed the night. And Richard sorely disturbed and perplexed, sought Kedgin. For something would have to be done, some help sought. Neither Burgoyne nor Blair, seemed to be the right sort of persons to turn to.

Richard, turning things over in his mind, received an inspiration. Bidding Kedgin to keep strict guard over the flat and its inmate, he hurried out, hailed a passing taxi-cab, and drove off to Maida Vale to seek the help of Frances Leverton.

CHAPTER XXXV
FOR SYLVIE’S SAKE

Richard went off to Maida Vale with no very clear or precise idea of what it was that he wanted Frances Leverton to do for him—all that he was really conscious of was that he had a vague desire to save the woman who had taken refuge under his roof and that it was necessary to have another woman’s help. He was too much agitated at the moment to recollect that Frances Leverton had no love for Mrs. Walsingham: all that he remembered was that he knew no other woman in London to whom he could turn; he therefore set off to the one he did know with a certain blind confidence. All the chivalry in his nature had been aroused by the sight of Sylvie’s distress, and it seemed to him that Frances, being a woman, must share it. He fully believed Sylvie’s story that the shooting of Werrick had been unintentional, and, if he could compass it, he meant to save her.

Frances, at the moment when Richard Shrewsbury was announced, was discussing the matter with Lizzie Bryce. The report of the detective agency with respect to the doings of Carsdale on the previous day lay on her desk; numerous newspapers, giving more or less complete circumstantial accounts of the affair at Marengo Mansions, were scattered about the room. And Frances knew that probably nothing but the shooting of Sydney Werrick had prevented the flight of both Carsdale and Sylvie Walsingham with the greater bulk of Richard’s money. She was pondering over this fact when her maid came in to announce that Mr. Shrewsbury was there and begged to see her.

Frances looked round at Lizzie Bryce in sheer wonder and dismay. She believed Richard to be in Paris, and she was sure that his coming to her implied some extraordinary turn of events. And Lizzie Bryce recognized the situation and prepared to quit the room. Before Frances had recovered her wits, Lizzie had spoken.

“I’ll go, Frank,” she said. “Mr. Shrewsbury will want to see you on business.”

“No—don’t,” exclaimed Frances. “I—I haven’t any business with him.” Then, remembering that the maid was still waiting, she looked uncertainly at Lizzie and said, “I don’t know what to do!”

“You will see him, of course,” said Lizzie. “You may be sure it is important business. Tell Jane to bring him in at once.”

Frances made a sign to the girl, and Lizzie Bryce disappeared into an inner room. And Richard, entering hurriedly, found Miss Leverton, seated at her desk, turning over papers and letters with an energy which a closer observer than the visitor would have quickly seen to be assumed. She looked up; even then Richard was too much preoccupied with his business to notice her heightened colour. He hurried towards her desk; Frances tried to look at him with professional coolness.

“Miss Leverton,” he began, without preface or greeting. “I——” But there he stopped, looking anxiously around him.

“Good morning,” said Frances. “What can I do for you, Mr. Shrewsbury?”

She was anxious that he should feel that she looked upon his call as a purely business one, and the assumed frigidity of her tone struck a chill to him. He began to wonder what she would say when she heard what he wanted her to do.

“I wanted to speak to you,” he said, feebly. “I suppose we are alone.”

“I see no one else in the room,” said Frances, half-satirically. “What is it, Mr. Shrewsbury?”

“You must pardon me if I seem flustered, or—or queer, you know,” he said. “I only got in from Paris at half-past five this morning, and I’ve been rushing about ever since.”

“Then you’d better sit down,” she said, pointing to a chair.

“Thank you,” said Richard, dropping into the nearest chair with a profound sigh. “The fact is—I’ve hurried to you because I want some help, and—I thought of you first.”

Frances affected great interest in her letters.

“Would not Captain Burgoyne—or Captain Blair—be more likely?” she suggested.

“No!” replied Richard. “I—I want a woman’s help. Look here—I’m going to be frank with you, because—well, because I believe in you. I’ll try to be as plain as possible, though I’m an awful hand at explaining things. You see, I feel in a muddle, because it’s only just now that I’m beginning to learn the truth. I see that you’ve read the newspapers, so you know what happened at—at Marengo Mansions last night?”

“I know,” answered Frances.

“Of course, I hadn’t a notion of—anything,” said Richard. “It seems, however, that Burgoyne and Blair had found out a lot, and Burgoyne got me over to Paris to tell me all about it. And—then, I insisted on coming back, and we travelled all night, and we went into the Charing Cross Hotel on arrival, and very soon we saw the morning papers, and read—all that. And about Carsdale, too. And then I drove to my bank, and had that confirmed. Then Burgoyne went to Blair, and I went home to Berkeley Square. And—I know you will wonder what it is that I am explaining to you, but I wanted to make everything quite clear—there, at home, I found——”

“Mrs. Walsingham,” said Frances, quietly and suddenly.

Richard started.

“How—how did you know that?” he exclaimed.

“I didn’t know it—I guessed it,” she said. “I suddenly realized what you were leading up to. Am I right?”

“You are quite right,” he answered quietly. “I found her there. It appears that she came there after dark last night, and Kedgin admitted her, and she took possession of a room. Yes—she is there. I have seen her.”

“Well?” said Frances, with well-assumed indifference. “And what then?”

Richard leaned forward and looked at her gravely.

“You know how I have been deceived,” he said. “I—I don’t understand it all, but I suppose I have been a great fool ever since I came to England. But I don’t bear her any grudge, you know, or ill-will, and I don’t like to see a woman hunted. She told me this morning that she shot that man unintentionally, and though she’s lied to me so much, I believe she told me the plain, real truth about this affair. And, if I can, I want to get her away—to help her to escape.”

“And why have you come to me?” asked Frances, looking steadily at him.

“Because I want you to help me,” he replied. “You’re clever—you can think of things, of ways of doing it. I couldn’t take her off in that nun’s dress she’s wearing—I thought you could suggest something in the way of disguise—that I could get her away in to-night, don’t you know.”

Frances laughed—intentionally. She wanted to know what Richard Shrewsbury was really thinking.

“That seems a very cool and calm request,” she said. “I think you forget that, in the first place, you are asking me to commit a crime, and, in the second, that Mrs. Walsingham and I are—enemies. Why should I do this for a woman who has injured me more than once?”

Richard looked at her for a moment. Then his face changed, and he slowly rose from his chair.

“I am sorry,” he said. “I thought——” But then he stopped and began to move towards the door. “At any rate you’ll forgive me for bothering you about the matter.”

With his hand on the door, he suddenly heard Frances’ voice.

“Mr. Shrewsbury!” she said.

Richard turned quickly.

“Yes?” he answered.

“Is it really because you only pity this woman that you want to help her?” she asked.

Richard stared.

“It is certainly for nothing else,” he replied. “I’m sorry for her—as I would be for anybody placed as she is.”

Frances bent over her letters.

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t help you,” she said in low tones. “But—do you realize what it means? You know that the police are scouring London for her, that all the railway stations and seaports are being watched, and that there is very little chance of her getting away. And to aid and abet her in it—well, whoever does that, and is detected, will run great risks. If I help you, we’re both liable to punishment, and all our professions of pity for her won’t palliate our offences.”

“I don’t want you to run any risk,” said Richard quickly. “That mustn’t be! What I wanted you to do was to help me about getting her some other clothing, or some disguise, or——”

At that moment the maid entered and glanced at her mistress. “Captain Blair,” she said.

“Show Captain Blair into the breakfast-room for a moment,” said Frances. She turned to Richard when they were alone again. “Mr. Shrewsbury,” she continued earnestly, “do take some good advice from me. Tell this to Captain Blair. He will respect your confidence, and he will know what ought to be done. Indeed, you don’t know what a serious matter this is—don’t be rash about it. And don’t think that I was unsympathetic with you, just now,” she added hurriedly. “I think it’s very good of you to feel like that about it, but—do tell Captain Blair.”

Richard looked at her steadily.

“Since you say so,” he said, “I’ll tell him. I’m surprised he’s here—I thought he was with Burgoyne. Yes—I’ll tell him.”

Blair, coming in, explained that Burgoyne had been with him, but had left soon after getting Richard’s telephone message, and that he himself had been about to call on Richard after seeing Miss Leverton.

“And Shrewsbury may as well know that I wanted to see you about Carsdale, Miss Leverton,” he said, “and I think you’ll have to tell him what you know and have taken trouble to find out.”

Frances looked a little annoyed and a good deal disturbed.

“Time enough for that, Captain Blair,” she said. “I think Mr. Carsdale is safe enough at present. Mr. Shrewsbury has something to tell you which he has just been telling me.”

And Richard told Blair everything of what he had discovered at the flat and of what he wished to do. But Blair, having listened quietly and attentively, shook his head.

“My dear boy,” he said, “that’s very good and disinterested of you, and all that sort of thing, but you can’t do it. Supposing you dress this unfortunate woman in anything Miss Leverton procures for you, how are you going to get her away? Drive her in your own motor to some quiet seaport? That would never do—the descriptions are everywhere, and the quieter the place the more likely that detection would follow. Do what you may, the fact that you were engaged to be married to her will come out—has, of course, come out to the police by now, through the maid, Sophie Guyner—and you will see that you will be interviewed and questioned and probably watched. I don’t think you’d get her out of London without being stopped.”

“Then what am I to do?” asked Richard. “Whatever she may have been or have done, she turned to me for shelter and help. Am I to open my door, and turn her out to the police, or turn them in upon her? Those things don’t appeal to me, either of them!”

“The best thing to be done,” said Blair, “is to quietly persuade her to give herself up. If she gives her explanation of how this affair occurred, it may be accepted—at present I don’t see any risk of her life, or even of heavy punishment. It is quite conceivable that, being alarmed at the presence of a strange man in her flat, she shot at and killed him. But she will do no good by flight. Better far to give herself up and state her version of the matter.”

“Will you come and talk to her, then?” asked Richard, gloomily. “I’m a poor hand at persuading—besides, I’m in the position of host to her, anyway.”

“Very well,” answered Blair. “I’ll go with you. Then our conversation,” he continued, turning to Frances, “must wait a few hours. You think there is no danger of Carsdale—that he’ll be detained awhile?”

“I think Carsdale is quite safe,” replied Frances, meaningly. “Quite safe.”

Blair nodded, and went off with Richard to Berkeley Square. And at the door of his rooms they found a stranger, a big, pleasant-faced man, who, after one sharp look at them, addressed Mr. Shrewsbury by name.

CHAPTER XXXVI
INSPECTOR SKARRATT INVESTIGATES

To one person, closely concerned in it, the affair which before morning had come to be famous as the Marengo Mansions Mystery, provided very little mystery at all. Inspector Skarratt did not believe for one moment that John Carsdale had had anything to do with the actual killing of Sydney Werrick. After interviewing the porter who had seen Carsdale arrive at the Mansions and getting the deliberately given opinion of the doctor who had first been called to Mrs. Walsingham’s flat, he came to the conclusion that Carsdale’s story was true, and that he had arrived there some little time after Werrick was shot and his wife fled. But he was also convinced, from the reports furnished to him by the friendly principal of the private detective agency, that Carsdale had been engaged in some strange transactions, and he was not without hope that through further inquiry into them he might elucidate some dark points of the primary affair and get upon the track of the escaped woman. And accordingly, having arranged for Carsdale’s detention, and caused descriptions of Mrs. Walsingham and suggestions as to her supposed flight to be circulated, he prepared, late as it was, to find out a little more about Mrs. Walsingham’s recent history.

Naturally, his thoughts turned to Mrs. Walsingham’s maid. Sophie Guyner had been kept at the police-station, entertained by a female searcher; more than once she had wanted to know when she would be at liberty to depart. And at last Skarratt himself went to her.

“Well, I think we shan’t want you any more to-night, Miss Guyner,” he said. “Of course, you’re not going back to that flat?”

Sophie tossed her head. Except that she must visit it sooner or later to collect her wardrobe and possessions, she had no desire to see the flat Number 29 in Marengo Mansions again.

“But you must give me an address,” said Skarratt. “I shall probably want you in the morning. And so will the coroner’s officer.”

“I’m going to a friend’s who lives up Hampstead way,” answered Sophie, and she gave the address. “They’ll take me in there.”

“I’m walking up Tottenham Court Road,” observed Skarratt. “In fact, I’m going to get a little supper at a quiet restaurant I know of. You look as if you’d do with something yourself. Will you come?”

Inspector Skarratt was a good-looking man, with a pleasant and engaging manner; Miss Guyner had no objection to accompanying him especially as supper was in view. Moreover, she wanted to talk about the event of the evening. And Skarratt, who had sized her up pretty conclusively before he invited her to supper, let her talk as they walked up the street, and he got a very retired corner in the quiet restaurant, and, without seeming to do so, encouraged her to talk still more; and he was treated to all her views, listening to them without agreeing with them. Amongst all the chaff of the maid’s conversation he knew that he would probably find some grain of wheat.

Miss Guyner was still convinced that Carsdale and Mrs. Walsingham had lured Werrick to the flat to kill him, after which they meant to escape. They had always wanted to be rid of him; they had deserted him in New York; now, when he had turned up again, they had meant to be rid of him for ever. Skarratt let her talk on, and refrained from pointing out the unlikelinesses and inconsistencies of her narrative. But when she had made an end he began to ask a quiet question or two, and so presently came to hear the story of Richard Shrewsbury, and of many things connected with him.

“And a nice surprise it will be for him,” said Miss Guyner. “He’s about as green as grass, or he’d have seen through more things than one. But this’ll wake him up, I should think—I expect he’ll see it in the newspapers to-morrow, won’t he? But perhaps not—he’s abroad just now. Paris.”

“Oh, they get the English papers in the gay city,” observed Skarratt. “Abroad, is he? And where does he live in London?”

Sophie gave full particulars of young Mr. Shrewsbury’s palatial flat in Berkeley Square. She had visited it twice with her mistress; the flats at Marengo Mansions were nothing to it. She enlarged upon its grandeur, its furniture, its appointments, and the detective listened eagerly and quietly. And as he listened and learnt, he began to see certain things and to understand others, and he congratulated himself on having asked Miss Guyner to sup with him.

“Ah!” he said. “Much gone on this young fellow, was she—your mistress?”

Sophie expressed her feelings in a sniff of contempt.

“Much gone on his money, you mean,” she said. “Talk about spiders and flies!—he was a fly, right enough, and she had him in her net right enough. Went for him dead from the first—I saw what the game was.”

“Got a good deal out of him, I suppose?” said Skarratt, carelessly. “Jewels and so on, of course?”

“She’d a diamond necklace out of him that was worth ten thousand,” answered Sophie, carelessly.

“And a lot of other things besides. He must have spent a lot of money on her—he was taking her out to dinner and to theatres, and so on, nearly every night.”

“And you say he’s in Paris?” asked the detective. “Now, between you and me, do you think she’ll try to get across there to him? I mean to say, if she can get over there, is he the sort that she could get round?”

“She got round him easy enough before,” replied Sophie. “Yes—if she could get to him there, I dare say she’d get round him all right. But what use would that be?—I mean, what use would it be now?”

Skarratt shook his head and looked knowing.

“Ah, you don’t know all the ins and outs of our trade!” he said. “You see, if this young fellow is really infatuated with her, he’ll believe her before anybody, and he’s rich, he would try to get her clean away. Money can do a lot, you know.”

“She wouldn’t be without money herself,” remarked Sophie. “She was a keen hand at making a purse, I can assure you.”

“Ah, well, I shouldn’t wonder if she makes for Paris,” said Skarratt. “However, there’ll be a good watch kept at all the ports from which the boats sail to France.”

Then, the little supper having come to an end, he gallantly escorted Miss Guyner to the top of Tottenham Court Road and put her in a bus going Hampstead way, asking her at the same time to attend at the police-station early next morning. And when the bus had gone on its journey, he stood for a moment reflecting on what he had heard, and then he pulled out his watch, and finding that it was just eleven o’clock, he hailed a passing taxi-cab and gave orders to its driver to take him to the Mount Street end of Berkeley Square. But before he had gone a hundred yards he changed his mind and altered his instructions—he would now go to New Scotland Yard.

At New Scotland Yard Skarratt picked up a subordinate, and gave the chauffeur his original instructions again. He wanted to make certain inquiries at the flats wherein Richard Shrewsbury lived, and it seemed to him that he might as well make them at once. Arrived in Berkeley Square, he bade his companion keep the cab and await his return; he himself got out and went to find the flats. He soon saw the object of his search, and perceived that it was a fine town house which had been divided up into select residential suites; he judged from that fact that his task would be of no great difficulty.

There was a hall-porter on the ground floor of the house—a military looking man who sat in a sort of glass-walled box near the entrance and was reading a newspaper. Perceiving Skarratt, he laid the newspaper aside and came out. His face suddenly changed: Skarratt saw that he himself had been recognized. That in no way displeased him—it made his task much easier.

“Good evening,” said Skarratt. “A word with you. Look here,” he continued, having followed the man into his box, “I’m from New Scotland Yard—here’s my card—Inspector Skarratt, you see.”

The hall-porter nodded.

“I know you by sight, Mr. Skarratt,” he said. “I used to be in the Metropolitan force until I had an accident. What is it, sir?”

“There’s a young gentleman named Shrewsbury lives in this building, isn’t there?” asked Skarratt.

The hall-porter looked surprised, and Skarratt noticed the look, and smiled.

“Nothing against him,” he said, reassuringly. “He’s away just now, isn’t he?”

“I believe he’s in Paris,” said the hall-porter. “His man said something about it.”

“Man live at the flat?” said Skarratt.

“Man and wife—name of Kedgin,” answered the hall-porter. “Mrs. Kedgin is away.”

“Ah, well, I don’t think I want to see Kedgin to-night,” said Skarratt. “I think you’ll do. I suppose you’ve been on duty here all the evening, eh?”

“Ever since eight o’clock, sir,” replied the hall-porter.

“Uninterruptedly?” asked Skarratt.

“Uninterruptedly,” answered the hall-porter.

“You’ve seen everybody who came in and went out, I suppose,” said Skarratt.

“So far as I know, Mr. Skarratt,” said the man.

“Well, now,” continued Skarratt, “you needn’t mention a word of what I’m going to say to you, but have you seen a woman enter who was dressed as a nun or a Sister of Mercy?”

The hall-porter reflected. But he could remember nothing of the sort suggested by the detective, nor did he remember a very important matter—namely, that, it being a very warm evening, he had dropped asleep for some eight or ten minutes just when twilight was fading into darkness. Therefore he shook his head.

“No, sir. I’ve seen nobody answering that description,” he said. “I remember everybody who went in and out to-night.”

“All right,” said Skarratt. “Well—look in the paper to-morrow morning, and you’ll see why I asked you. By the by, have you ever seen a lady come here to see Mr. Shrewsbury—a lady who had her maid with her?”

“That’ll be the lady he’s going to marry,” said the hall-porter. “Kedgin told me about her. Name of Mrs. Walsingham. Yes, sir, I’ve seen her a time or two, and the maid as well—pert young woman.”

“You haven’t seen Mrs. Walsingham here to-night?” asked Skarratt.

But the man shook his head. No—it was quite a week since he had seen Mrs. Walsingham. And Skarratt bade him keep silence as regards his, Skarratt’s visit, and mentioned that he should very likely call round in the morning to see Kedgin, and again referred the hall-porter to the morning newspaper, and went away to dismiss his subordinate as being of no use to him that night and to go home himself. For Skarratt had no idea of stopping out of bed to think and plan and scheme.

But he was up and at work next morning at an early hour. There was no news of Mrs. Walsingham. Strict watch was being kept at seaports and railway stations, but nobody answering to her description had been seen. It was drawing near to noon before Skarratt heard any news. And what he heard then came from an unexpected quarter—the hall-porter at the flat in Berkeley Square.

The hall-porter sent Skarratt a wire which took him hurrying around. He found the man looking puzzled and doubtful.

“I don’t know how it could be, Mr. Skarratt,” he said when he and the detective were alone, “but I’ve heard that a woman dressed like a nun did come in here last night. I say I can’t make it out, for——”

“Never mind that,” said Skarratt. “What have you heard?”

“Well, sir, Jympson, who’s caretaker of that house across there, didn’t happen to see the papers until late this morning,” answered the hall-porter. “As soon as he did, he hurried across to me and said that last night, just about dark, he saw a nun come in here—certain of it—but thought nothing of it. Then I wired you at once. But how I could miss seeing——”

“All right,” said Skarratt. “Now, have you seen anything this morning—of such a woman, I mean?”

“Nothing, sir. But Mr. Shrewsbury’s back. Came in about two hours ago, and went out again soon afterwards,” said the man. “I haven’t even seen Kedgin to-day.”

“I’m going up, then,” said Skarratt. “By the by, is this the only entrance to this place? No back entrance, is there?”

The hall-porter replied that there was no other entrance than that, and Skarratt went on his way upstairs. He had knocked twice at the door of the flat without receiving any answer, when Richard and Captain Blair came up and joined him.

CHAPTER XXXVII
THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR

Richard came to a halt as Inspector Skarratt addressed him. He glanced sharply at the detective and instantly guessed his profession and his business. Skarratt smiled pleasantly and politely and drew out a card. He presented it with a slight bow.

“You will see that I am a police-officer, Mr. Shrewsbury,” he said. “I called here to make some inquiries of you, sir.”

“What is it?” asked Richard. He glanced from the card to the door, wondering vaguely why it was not opened, for he had heard Skarratt’s second and loud summons as he came along the corridor. “Has no one answered you?” he said, without waiting for Skarratt’s reply to his first question.

“I’ve knocked—loudly—twice,” he said, “and no one has appeared yet,” answered Skarratt. “Perhaps your servants are out?”

Without replying, Richard drew his key from his pocket. But on the point of inserting it in the latch, he paused and glanced at Skarratt. He had little doubt of what the detective was after, but he wanted to make sure.

“What do you want with me?” he asked brusquely.

“Very little,” replied Skarratt. “And I’ll tell you in a few words. You have doubtless read the morning papers, Mr. Shrewsbury, and so you’re aware of what took place last night at Marengo Mansions. You’ll also be aware that the woman known as Mrs. Walsingham escaped from her flat in the dress of a nun. I have information that she was seen to enter this building about dark last night, in that dress, and I cannot find that she has ever left it. And naturally I conclude that she is hiding in your rooms. I think that’s all clear, Mr. Shrewsbury?”

Richard turned and looked at Blair. And Blair made a motion of lips and eyes which said as plainly as words could have said: “Tell him!”

“Very well,” said Richard. He turned to Skarratt. “Yes,” he said, “I think your information is right. I found Mrs. Walsingham here when I came in from Paris this morning, and I left her here while I went out to get some advice from friends. Captain Blair, here, came back with me to advise her to give herself up to the police.”

“Best thing she can do, sir!” said Skarratt, heartily. “The very best thing—if she’s still there, Mr. Shrewsbury.”

“Still there?” exclaimed Richard. “What do you mean?”

Skarratt smiled.

“I’ve knocked—loudly—twice,” he said, “and no one comes. Hadn’t we better go in, Mr. Shrewsbury?”

Richard opened the outer door of his rooms with a curious presentiment of coming surprise, if not of evil. As they stepped into the hall a strange consciousness that the place was deserted came over him. He called Kedgin’s name, loudly. There was no answer, and he looked at his companions wonderingly.

“That’s queer,” he said. “I gave Kedgin strict instructions not to leave the place until I returned.”

Skarratt was already looking into one doorway after another—he passed into the servants’ part of the chambers, and came hurriedly back.

“No one there,” he said. “Where did you leave this woman, sir?”

Richard walked into the dining-room, with Skarratt at his heels, and pointed to a door.

“She was in that room,” he answered. “She had locked herself in.”

Skarratt crossed to the door which Richard had indicated and tried the handle. It turned easily; he pushed the door open and looked within the room.

“Ah!” he said. “Look here, gentlemen!”

Blair and Richard, following him, also glanced into the room from over his shoulders. And there, thrown carelessly across the rail of the bed, was the black garb of a nun, with all its accessories.

“I thought so!” exclaimed the detective, entering the room. “I thought so, gentlemen. I’m too late—she’s off! Flown!”

“But—how?” said Richard. “How?”

Skarratt glanced at Captain Blair, and turned to Richard with a dry laugh.

“How, sir?” he said. “Didn’t you leave your man to act as gaoler?”

“Yes—yes!” answered Richard. “But——”

“No buts about it, Mr. Shrewsbury,” said Skarratt. “She’s only done what prisoners in much safer places sometimes do with their gaolers—she’s got round him.”

“But I tell you,” said Richard, impatiently, “I tell you that when I left her she was ill, worn out—she said she’d been obliged to take a sleeping-draught and hadn’t got over it. She was too weary to talk to me, and——”

“Pardon me for interrupting you, sir, but I should say that was all clever acting to deceive you and get you out of the way,” said Skarratt, cynically. “No, sir—she’s got round the man. Who is he, and where did you get him?”

“His name is William Kedgin, and he was highly recommended to me by Mr. Carsdale,” answered Richard.

“No great recommendation I should think, sir,” observed Skarratt, who had been looking round the bedroom. “See here, gentlemen!—the lady’s been making up a bit for her new part,” and he picked up from the dressing-table a stick of grease-paint. “It was a mistake on her part to leave that. Now we must find out in what sort of garments she made her exit. Wasn’t this man, Kedgin married, sir, and isn’t his wife away just now?”

“Yes,” answered Richard, who was feeling by that time that he wished he had never heard of Carsdale or Mrs. Walsingham, or even of London. “Yes, that’s so in both cases.”

“Then I suppose this woman has gone off in some of Mrs. Kedgin’s clothes,” said Skarratt. “The probability is that the flight had been arranged when you got here, that they both acted to you, and that they were off very soon after your back was turned. Now then, sir, let me give you a piece of advice. I dare say you’ve plenty of portable property in these rooms?”

Richard stared at him blankly.

“Portable property?” he said. “What do you mean?”

“I mean jewellery, silver, anything worth money that’s easily carried away,” answered Skarratt, smiling in pity at the young man’s slowness of comprehension. “Perhaps, also, you’ve such matters as valuable pictures, wines, cigars, and so on.”

“Well?” said Richard.

“Then, while I pursue certain investigations of my own,” continued Skarratt, “let me advise you to have a careful look round and see if you’ve lost anything.”

And he went out of the room, with a look at Blair which was as much to imply that Richard was not fit to look after himself.

Richard sat down on the side of the bed and stared at the sombre garments which the fugitive had cast aside.

“Damn!” he said suddenly. “If that’s true about Kedgin I think I shall chuck believing in people. I thought he was a thoroughly dependable chap!”

“Come and see if it is true,” said Blair. “I don’t think there’s any doubt that Kedgin has helped this woman to get away. Where will you begin?—have you any jewellery in the place?”

Richard stared at his companion as if he could scarcely comprehend how a sane man should ask such a question.

“Only two or three thousand pounds’ worth,” he answered laconically. “I—I used to buy things on—on her advice.”

“Well, where is it?” asked Blair.

A moment later, each man knew that that was not a question which was going to be easily answered. It appeared that Richard, full of belief in the Kedgin standard of honour, had kept his valuables in a drawer in his bedroom which he confessed to leaving unlocked. The satin-lined cases were in the drawer, but pins, rings, sleeve-links, odds and ends of pearls, diamonds, and good gold, had vanished.

“Now, then, where did you keep your silver?” asked Blair, making no comment on the disappearance of the jewellery.

The silver was gone, too. Blair made no comment on that, either: he had expected it. The silence grew deep between Richard and himself as they continued their work of exploration. And the result, tabulated, was appalling. Blair, always practical, jotted things down, and handed the list to Skarratt when he made his reappearance.

Articles of jewellery, worth approximately, £3000.
Silver, worth £500.
Wine, worth £300 or £400.
Cigars, worth £200.
Linen, worth unknown.
Clothing, worth £100.
Pictures and old China, £1000.

“Kedgin’s work, of course,” observed Skarratt, “but he couldn’t carry these things away with him now, you know, sir. No wonder he seemed agitated when you turned up this morning. He’s had these got off in readiness for his departure. Mrs. Walsingham most likely interrupted him last night; you interrupted him again to-day. And the probability is that she detected him, and that they made common cause together, and that they went together as soon as you were clear of the place a few hours ago. And now, gentlemen, I’ll show you how they went.”

“You’ve found that out?” said Blair.

“I think I’ve found it out,” answered Skarratt. “But come and see for yourselves.”

He led the way into the servants’ part of the flat and into the Kedgin sitting-room, where everything was neat, orderly, and comfortable. And there he went to the window and drew aside a curtain.

“Now, gentlemen,” he said, “look out there. You will see that this room looks upon a sort of small square or opening, and that this house in which we now are, and of which this flat of Mr. Shrewsbury’s forms the entire top floor, is at an angle of that square. You can also see, by looking from this corner, that the next house is empty. Now, come with me.”

Skarratt took them through other rooms to one which had been used as a box and lumber room and pointed to an iron ladder that led to a skylight in the roof. He began to climb; the others followed.

“They went this way, gentlemen,” he said. “Come up—now we step on the leads of the empty house; now we go down another ladder. And now we are in the empty house itself!”

To Blair and Richard the sense of being in a house which was empty of life struck with a cold and unpleasant feeling. Moreover, the house was obviously old and damp and malodorous; the staircases down which Skarratt led his companions creaked so much that they would not have been surprised if they had suddenly found themselves sinking through the rotten timbers. But Skarratt went cheerily onward.

“Property all coming down, gentlemen,” he said. “And time it did—there used to be some old property as bad as this where your house is now, Mr. Shrewsbury. Well, here we are now in the hall—now come to the back. Now, then, you see—here’s a side door, and it’s—open. And it admits, you see, to a passage which runs away into a side-street. That’s how they got off—in my opinion.”

“Probably,” said Blair. He looked about him with dislike. “Let’s get out of this,” he said. “It gives me the horrors.”

“Yes,” said Richard. “It’s beastly.”

Skarratt said nothing. He smiled, and led the way back up the creaking and gloomy staircase, looking about him with sharp, keen glances as he went. And suddenly, as they turned at a landing, on which the doors of the empty rooms stood half or wholly open the detective stepped back on his companions with an exclamation of horrified surprise.

“My God, gentlemen!” he said. “What—what’s that?”

Following his pointing and trembling finger, Blair and Richard glanced through an open door into a dusk-filled chamber. Through a crack in the shutters came a single shaft of light, and it fell full on a woman’s hand and arm, lying within their range of vision. Nothing else was to be seen, and for a moment the three stared. And neither hand nor arm moved.

Then, with a sudden cry of comprehension, Skarratt leapt into the room, the others after him. One tore open the shutters. And so they recognized the woman who was wanted, and saw that Kedgin had lured her into this lonely house, and had left her there—dead.

CHAPTER XXXVIII
SALVING A FORTUNE

In the hasty, yet careful reckoning up of chances which he made as soon as his victim was dead Mr. William Kedgin came to the conclusion that it would be some time before her body was discovered in the empty house. He considered that there were two things in his favour. The first was that when Shrewsbury’s rooms came to be found empty, the impression would be given that he, Kedgin, had helped Mrs. Walsingham to escape, and that the police would give all their attention to her and none to the place which had harboured her for the night—therefore, some little time would necessarily elapse before suspicion would rest on him for the theft of his master’s property. The second—and perhaps more important one—was that he saw no immediate prospect of any examination of the empty house. Kedgin knew all about that house: he had made himself master of it and its history as soon as he came to reside under Richard’s roof. He knew it as a poor old derelict, left to itself until the housebreakers were ready to demolish it, and that event was not yet to come off. He foresaw no possibility of its being entered at once, of the immediate discovery of the body of the woman upon whom he had turned as he led her down the dark stairs, and accordingly believed that he had a clear and a serviceable start of the hounds of Justice which would sooner or later be let loose on his track. His preparations had already been made—made before Sylvie Werrick came on the scene and interrupted them. Then he had seen a further chance of increasing his spoil—that her death was necessary to that increase was, in Kedgin’s opinion, a mere trifling detail. Now that it was over, and her realizable possessions in his power, he could go on with his precious scheme.

So Kedgin went away from the empty house, leaving by the passage which Skarratt had shown to his companions. The passage led him into certain by-ways at the rear of the big houses—finally he emerged into Conduit Street. No one of all the hurrying throngs there, or in Hanover Square, through which he presently sauntered, or in Regent Street, across which he presently hurried, knew him for a murderer: if they saw him at all, they took him for a respectable gentleman’s gentleman, going, no doubt, about his business. He was calm, he was serene—there was nothing on him to show the work in which he had been engaged so recently. Nor did the landlady of the little house in the small side-street off Golden Square, to which Kedgin repaired, and wherein he had tenanted a room for some time past, notice anything out of the way or peculiar about her lodger when he came in, and in passing her on his way upstairs observed that he was going away for a day or two and must pack his portmanteau. She had known Mr. Kidd, she said afterwards, as a very quiet gentleman whom she understood to be engaged at nights, as a rule, and who was only in now and then during the day; who always paid his rent promptly and generously and had a kind word and a sixpence for the children: that he could strangle a lady in a lonely house was more than she could believe.

Kedgin had everything in readiness for his flight. He had soon come to see that young Mr. Shrewsbury was not only callow, but careless, and after Mrs. Kedgin—a lady of whom her husband was weary—had retired to the country to visit a friend, it had been an easy thing to rob him and to turn the proceeds of the robbery into good money. He had the good money in such a form that it was easily carried and always available, and now there was nothing to do but add to it the proceeds of the robbery and removal (he did not care to call it murder) of Sylvie Werrick, who, doubtless, would have been highly disgusted could she have known that her own carefully-laid plans had been made for the benefit of another. So, once in his room, he went about his final preparations quietly, methodically, and without hurry. He was under the firm belief that he had at least twenty-four hours’ start of any pursuit, and he knew where he would be in twenty-four hours from that time.

It was not in Kedgin’s scheme to leave his room just yet, for he had mapped his movements out to a minute. So when he had finished his packing, and had strapped his portmanteau, he indulged himself with a small cigar—one of Richard’s—and a glass of wine—also Richard’s—and idled about his room, destroying whatever small traces of his occupancy still happened to be in it. And after a time he chanced to be near the window and to look out of it. Then he saw something that made the cigar drop from his lips and sent him staggering against the wall at his side.

On the opposite side-walk, following the very track by which he himself had approached the house only an hour before, came a great dog, a blood-hound, red of eye and mouth, straining at a leash held by a big man who hurried behind it. And behind him were other men: Kedgin knew some of them—Captain Burgoyne, and Captain Blair, with his one arm, and Richard Shrewsbury and others. They were excited, they were talking. And the great beast before them came steadily on, came just where he himself had come; if the path had been dripping with blood he could not have come in a straighter line, said Kedgin with a curse. Now he was straining across the street; now the men behind him were pointing upward ... they had seen Kedgin’s white face at the window.

Then Kedgin stepped back and drew a revolver from his pocket. This had been beyond all his calculations. And there was no back way out of this house. This was—the end.

“That was an inspiration of yours, getting that hound, Captain Burgoyne,” said Skarratt, later on in the day, “and it was lucky, sir, that you could put your hand on him there and then. You’ve got to thank Captain Burgoyne, Mr. Shrewsbury, for that notion—if it hadn’t been for that, it strikes me that we might have had some difficulty in running down Kedgin and such property of yours as he had on him and at his command. A cool, determined customer, that, gentlemen!”

Nobody made any reply to the detective’s remarks. They were all back in the rooms at Berkeley Square, and Richard was feeling as if the events of the last few hours had been too much for him. The woman who had deceived and robbed him had met her death at the hands of a murderer; the murderer had taken his own life; it was little satisfaction to him to know that his property was being salved in this fashion. So he gave no answer to Skarratt; instead, he glanced at Burgoyne. And suddenly he jumped up.

“I can’t stand this, Burgoyne!” he said. “I shall choke if I stop in these rooms any longer. I’m going out where I can breathe—and to-night I shall stay at the Ritz. I shan’t come back here—I’m sick of this place—I never want to see it again.”

“There are matters to clear up, you know,” replied Burgoyne, slowly. “You can’t do everything at once. There’s—Carsdale, for instance.” He paused and looked at Skarratt. “What are you going to do about Carsdale?” he asked. “There’s no doubt that the property you found on him is Mr. Shrewsbury’s, you know.”

Skarratt smiled.

“No doubt, sir,” he answered. “And, of course, Mr. Shrewsbury can deal with Carsdale when we’ve done with him. And that reminds me of two matters which this morning’s events had put out of my mind for the moment. I may as well tell you that we have just about finished with Carsdale. I, personally, haven’t the least doubt that he told the truth about his presence at Marengo Mansions. We can’t connect him with Werrick’s death. And so—we shall let him go. That’s one thing. And the other is that this morning Carsdale sent for me and asked me to arrange for an interview between himself and a solicitor who would act on your behalf, Mr. Shrewsbury, in your absence. He wants to hand over those securities, and so on, and to explain what he was doing with them. He mentioned a Mr. Winch of Lincoln’s Inn, as a likely man. But as you’re back, Mr. Shrewsbury, hadn’t you better see him yourself and take up your property?”

Richard shook his head. He looked appealingly at Burgoyne.

“No!” he said stoutly. “I won’t see him—it’s no good asking me to see him—I trusted him. Burgoyne—won’t you act for me? Let him give up what he’s got: he’s welcome to anything beyond that. Only let him understand that I don’t want to see him again. Take Winch if you like—do anything you like. You’ll find me at the Ritz. I’ll never come into these rooms again.”

“Very well,” said Burgoyne. “I’ll see him.”

So Richard went out of his palatial residence for the last time, a much disillusioned young man, and locked the door and put the key in his pocket, and went away, resolved to sell all the belongings he left behind him, and to clear matters up generally, and when that was done to go back to Trinidad or somewhere equally remote and begin a new life. He was still cogitating these projects when Burgoyne found him at the hotel later in the afternoon. He looked up at Burgoyne apathetically, and watched him without interest as he produced a packet of papers which he laid on a table and placed his hand upon.

“That man, Carsdale,” said Burgoyne, without preface, “is the most plausible person I ever met! Winch and I saw him, in Skarratt’s presence. To any one who did not know him as well as I do, now, his story would have seemed the most straightforward thing in the world. He produced papers signed by you which gave him full power to deal with your securities at the bank. He explained his action in dealing with two hundred thousand pounds’ worth of them by saying that he wished to re-invest. He handed over the papers relating to his transactions—they’re all here, and Winch says you’re all right as regards the two hundred thousand. Then, of course, there’s the fifty thousand worth at the bank, which he didn’t touch. It seems to me that what you’ll lose, Dick, my boy, will be the ten thousand you gave him to play with, as he called it. I should say that’s gone.”

“Let it go!” exclaimed Richard.

“Just so,” agreed Burgoyne. “After all, you’ve bought your experience fairly cheaply in comparison with what you might have paid for it. But, my boy, it was a near touch-and-go. Do you know whom you’ve to thank for keeping an eye on Carsdale?—he’d have got away but for a friend that you haven’t thought of. He swears now that he got those tickets for Mr. and Mrs. Werrick, and was going to send them off, and start them afresh in life, but that’s all rot!—he meant them for himself and the woman. And he’d have got away but for two things on which he didn’t reckon—first the affair at Marengo Mansions, and, second, that he was being watched on your behalf, and that he’d have been arrested that very night. That’s a fact, my son!”

Richard stared at his informant for a full moment of silence.

“Who was watching him on my behalf?” he asked at last.

Burgoyne smiled and passed Richard the packet of papers.

“Miss Leverton,” he answered. “And you ought to thank her that you’ve got—those!”

Richard jumped to his feet, thrusting the papers into his pocket. He seized his hat and made for the door.

“I’ll do that—now!” he said.

He had thought of a thousand things to say as he hurried to Maida Vale, but when he was alone with Miss Frances Leverton, young Mr. Shrewsbury’s ideas and thoughts seemed to have become utterly confused, and he soon felt that he was making a mess of everything. And suddenly he gave up the task.

“That isn’t a bit what I wanted to say,” he said, despairingly. “I’m no good at saying—anything. Only, I wanted you to know that I’m—grateful, you know, because you thought of me, and so on. And—there was a thing I wanted to ask of you.”

“Yes?” said Frances.

“You—you said I might come to tea one Sunday—oh, it seems ages ago, now!—and I didn’t come,” he said. “Will you let me come, some other time?”

Frances turned away, smiling, and touched a bell.

“We are just going to have tea,” she said, quietly. “Won’t you stop?”

THE END

The novels of
J. S. FLETCHER

“Without question the supreme detective story writer of today.”—Brooklyn Eagle

DEAD MEN’S MONEY

“Murder and attempted murder and abduction, missing heirs, false impersonation, and other complications, the unravelling of which makes an entertaining tale for those who seek relaxation.”—Philadelphia Public Ledger

THE MIDDLE TEMPLE MURDER

A peculiarly puzzling murder story in which the finger of suspicion darts about from one person to another as erratically as flashes of lightning.

THE CHESTERMARKE INSTINCT

Concerns the sudden and inexplicable disappearance of the manager of a country bank.

THE TALLEYRAND MAXIM

The peculiarly moving story of a young man who gets on in life by hook or crook, with no objection to crime or deception, remarkably resourceful, and who takes life as a game to be played while the playing is good.

THE PARADISE MYSTERY

The quiet repose of an old English cathedral town is suddenly shattered by a series of remarkable crimes whose deep laid mystery is involved with a charming love story.

THE ORANGE-YELLOW DIAMOND

“A rattling good yarn ... the excellence does not depend entirely however upon its plot ... an uncommonly well written tale.”—New York Times

THE BOROUGH TREASURER

An ingenious tale of crime, cleverly and logically developed. The absorbed reader will find it difficult to turn his attention to other matters until he has reached the solution.

THE HERAPATH PROPERTY

An enthralling narrative of a strange testament and of the way certain individuals tried to break it.

SCARHAVEN KEEP

The mysterious adventure of a popular actor in an ancient English castle overlooking the sea.

THE RAYNER-SLADE AMALGAMATION

The story of a murderer who was asked to help run down his own crime, of a beautiful woman who fled across England at the dead of night, of a daring intrigue which involved the fates of an American, a Dutchman, and a Russian Princess.

RAVENSDENE COURT

“The most complicated and in some ways the most finished of Mr. Fletcher’s works in this special line. It will not stop a clock, but will keep readers from looking at one.”—New York World

THE LOST MR. LINTHWAITE

Mr. Linthwaite, charming and gentlemanly, is seen. Mr. Linthwaite is gone. How? Where?

EXTERIOR TO THE EVIDENCE

Another remarkable murder story, set against a wild and desolate moorland, and as deftly worked out as anything Mr. Fletcher has ever written.

THE MARKENMORE MYSTERY

Of course the idea is “Who killed Guy Markenmore and why?”, but the story is far from an ordinary detective tale, and the interest burns steadily through the whole book.

THE KING VERSUS WARGRAVE

“As has been the case with many another novel from his pen, the reader of this volume early gets the impression and retains it to the end that Mr. Fletcher is a novelist of high order and not merely a writer of good detective stories.”—Boston Herald

THE MAZAROFF MYSTERY

A curious story of sudden death and concealed identity, and one of the most thrilling of all Fletcher books.

THE TIME-WORN TOWN

A dramatic unravelling of the enigmatic life of the Mayor of Hathelborough who chose to remain, night after night, undisturbed with his books and strange papers.

THE WOLVES AND THE LAMB

Three hundred thousand pounds! How much would you do for them? Mr. Fletcher’s latest fascinating mystery is a marvellously skilful tangle of finance, law and greed with a woman’s vanity at its center.

Each volume $2.00 net at all bookstores

ALFRED · A · KNOPF

730 FIFTH AVENUE NEW YORK

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:

Perceived typographical errors have been corrected.

Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.

Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.

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Table of Contents

- THE WOLVES AND THE LAMB
- CONTENTS
- CHAPTER I THE WOLVES
- CHAPTER II THE LAMB
- CHAPTER III A DEAD MAN’S ORDERS
- CHAPTER IV “HE WILL BE JUST IN TIME!”
- CHAPTER V THE INITIAL PACES
- CHAPTER VI MRS. WALSINGHAM AT HOME
- CHAPTER VII CARSDALE’S CAREFULNESS
- CHAPTER VIII A PLEDGE REDEEMED
- CHAPTER IX PLAIN SPEECH
- CHAPTER X NEWS FOR MRS. WALSINGHAM
- CHAPTER XI UNFORESEEN
- CHAPTER XII MR. CARSDALE’S CHAMBERS
- CHAPTER XIII THE BOND STREET JEWELLER
- CHAPTER XIV BURGOYNE STARTS A NEW TRAIL
- CHAPTER XV MRS. WALSINGHAM ADMITS
- CHAPTER XVI CONSPIRATORS
- CHAPTER XVII A STUDENT OF PROBLEMS
- CHAPTER XVIII BLAIR’S THIRD NOTION
- CHAPTER XIX THE MAN AT THE THEATRE DOOR
- CHAPTER XX MR. CARSDALE IS CONFRONTED
- CHAPTER XXI A WEAVING OF WEBS
- CHAPTER XXII A COUNCIL OF WAR
- CHAPTER XXIII THE EVE OF THE BATTLE
- CHAPTER XXIV MISS GUYNER INTERVENES
- CHAPTER XXV THE BLANK CHEQUE
- CHAPTER XXVI EVERY WOMAN FOR HERSELF
- CHAPTER XXVII PLAIN TRUTH
- CHAPTER XXVIII A QUESTION OF ACCOUNT
- CHAPTER XXIX THE SILENT TENANT
- CHAPTER XXX BURGOYNE FACES THE MUSIC
- CHAPTER XXXI WAS IT MURDER?
- CHAPTER XXXII SLEUTH HOUNDS
- CHAPTER XXXIII SANCTUARY
- CHAPTER XXXIV KNIGHT-ERRANT
- CHAPTER XXXV FOR SYLVIE’S SAKE

- CHAPTER XXXVI INSPECTOR SKARRATT INVESTIGATES

- CHAPTER XXXVII THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR
- CHAPTER XXXVIII SALVING A FORTUNE
- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE