CHAPTER XXVI
THE SCHEME.
As Clarence Carr left Vanderbilt Hall he seemed to be in even higher spirits than usual. Swinging briskly down the drive with a smile on his face and humming a little tune under his breath, he passed through the ornate gateway and turned to his left down Chapel Street.
He had good reason to be satisfied with the evening’s work. He had been even more successful than he had hoped. The ball had been started rolling, and there was nothing left for him now but to watch it carefully and make sure that it kept on its way.
It took but a moment to reach the New Haven House, where he paused in the lobby, keenly scrutinizing the occupants of the comfortable leather-covered chairs.
“Not here,” he murmured under his breath. “But I hardly expected he would be.”
Without delay, he passed on to the bar, and he had scarcely stepped inside the doorway before his eyes fell upon the figure of the man for whom he was looking.
He was rather under medium height, and very fat. The striking, violet-colored waistcoat covered a vast expanse of rotundity, and across the front was looped a massive gold chain which looked almost like a cable, hanging pendant from which, at the point where it passed through the buttonhole, were half a dozen fobs, lockets, and diamond-studded trinkets.
In the scarf of violet silk, which just matched the waistcoat, sparkled a large diamond. On several of the pudgy fingers were a plentitude of rings—also set with diamonds. But the most remarkable feature of the man was the face which topped the barrel-like figure, and which had the grotesque appearance of being set directly upon the broad, check-clad shoulders without the usual formality of a neck.
It was smooth-shaven, round, and jolly, merging imperceptibly into the bat-wing collar by a series of double chins. The eyes were small, deep-set and blue, and had in them an expression of such infantile innocence as to be almost incongruous. This, together with the soft, smooth, pink-and-white skin, gave him the look of a plump, good-natured cherub, who had allowed his taste for rather vivid colorings and effects in the matter of dress to run riot.
But J. Harry Edgerton was very far from living up to his appearance. There was nothing whatever of the innocent cherub about his personality, though he had often found it expedient and profitable to allow that impression to prevail. It had been invaluable in leading strangers to stay with him in a stiff poker game, under the impression that the pouting, childlike look of dismay as he surveyed his hand was a true reflection of the cards themselves. Too late they would discover that Edgerton was simply bluffing, and they would retire from the game sadder, wiser, and poorer men.