Levy said not a word until he had reconducted his visitor into his den of destruction, all gleaming with spoliaria in rosewood. Then he said this: “If, Lord L’Estrange, you seek but revenge on Audley Egerton, you need not have uttered those threats. I too—hate the man.”
Harley looked at him wistfully, and the nobleman felt a pang that he had debased himself into a single feeling which the usurer could share. Nevertheless, the interview appeared to close with satisfactory arrangements, and to produce amicable understanding. For as the baron ceremoniously followed Lord L’Estrange through the hall, his noble visitor said, with marked affability,
“Then I shall see you at Lansmere with Mr. Egerton, to assist in conducting his election. It is a sacrifice of your time worthy of your friendship; not a step farther, I beg. Baron, I have the honour to wish you good-evening.”
As the street door opened on Lord L’Estrange he again found himself face to face with Randal Leslie, whose hand was already lifted to the knocker.
“Ha, Mr. Leslie!—you too a client of Baron Levy’s,—a very useful, accommodating man.”
Randal stared and stammered. “I come in haste from the House of Commons on Mr. Egerton’s business. Don’t you hear the newspaper vendors crying out ‘Great News, Dissolution of Parliament’?”
“We are prepared. Levy himself consents to give us the aid of his talents. Kindly, obliging, clever person!” Randal hurried into Levy’s study, to which the usurer had shrunk back, and was now wiping his brow with his scented handkerchief, looking heated and haggard, and very indifferent to Randal Leslie.
“How is this?” cried Randal. “I come to tell you first of Peschiera’s utter failure, the ridiculous coxcomb, and I meet at your door the last man I thought to find there,—the man who foiled us all, Lord L’Estrange. What brought him to you? Ah, perhaps his interest in Egerton’s election?”
“Yes,” said Levy, sulkily. “I know all about Peschiera. I cannot talk to you now; I must make arrangements for going to Lansmere.”
“But don’t forget my purchase from Thornhill. I shall have the money shortly from a surer source than Peschiera.”