“No matter about that. It will be, in course of time. I have every confidence in Haviland, he’s as honest a chap as ever breathed. He’ll fix up all our interests over there, in apple-pie order and don’t you forget it! Humor me in this thing, Polly, and believe I know more of business affairs than you do, and it’s best to do as I say.”
Pauline was easily persuaded, and as the arrangement was conceded to be merely temporary, she agreed. Jeffries came. The two wills were drawn, signed and witnessed, all in correct form. Loria, in his, bequeathed to Pauline all he might die possessed of, and except for a few charities and minor bequests, Pauline left her fortune to Carr. The business was soon over, and Loria took both documents, saying he would put them in his Safe Deposit box for the present, as Pauline had no place for valuable papers.
The next day, Loria, accompanied by the invaluable Ahri, went away to the site of his projected enterprise. This affair was conducted with such strict secrecy that even the location was not known to many. Actual work had not yet been begun, but negotiations and preparations of vast importance were being made, and secret conclaves were held by those most interested. Pauline had been emphatically adjured to give not the least hint to any one whatever of the project, and she had promised faithfully to obey Carr’s injunctions.
The next afternoon, a telegram from Fleming Stone announced his arrival at Alexandria and his immediate appearance in Cairo.
Addressed to her, in Loria’s care, Pauline received it duly, for her mail was brought to her at Shepheard’s, and Carr’s forwarded to him wherever he might be. She had had a cable from Haviland, but no American letters had yet reached her. Stone, having sailed just a week after Pauline’s departure from New York, was arriving eight days after her own advent at Cairo.
The girl’s first emotion was of joy. The thought of seeing Stone again, eclipsed all other thoughts.
“Oh, Mrs. Mac!” she cried, clasping that somewhat rotund matron round the waist and leading her an enforced dance. “Mr. Stone is coming! Will be here for tea! Oh, I am so glad!”
But her second thoughts were more disturbing. Why was he coming? What were his suspicions? Could he be tracking her down? Though Fleming Stone had never said a word of love to her, Pauline knew, by her own heart’s ‘detective instinct,’ that he cared. But, his sense of duty might make it necessary to follow where the trail of suspicion led, even at cost of his own affections. Then, too, could he suspect?—But Pauline’s irrepressible joy at thought of seeing him left her little time or wish to indulge in gloomy forebodings.
Singing, she ran off to dress for Stone’s reception.
“Which is prettier?” she asked of Mrs. Mac, holding up an embroidered white crêpe, of Cairo construction, and a black net gown, brought from New York.