"I suppose it's useless for me to ask if there's anything I can do to help?" Richard enquired.
"You've helped already," Hunterleys replied. "I have been nearly three months without being able to open my lips to a soul. People call me secretive, but I feel very human sometimes. I know that not a word of what I have said will pass your lips."
"Not a chance of it," Richard promised earnestly. "But look here, can't I do something? If I am not an Englishman, I'm all for the Anglo-Saxons. I hate these foreigners—that is to say the men," he corrected himself hastily.
Hunterleys smiled.
"Well, I was coming to that," he said. "I do feel hideously alone here, and what I would like you to do is just this. I would like you to call at my room at the Hotel de Paris, number 189, every morning at a certain fixed hour—say half-past ten. Just shake hands with me—that's all. Nothing shall prevent my being visible to you at that hour. Under no consideration whatever will I leave any message that I am engaged or have gone out. If I am not to be seen when you make your call, something has happened to me."
"And what am I to do then?"
"That is the point," Hunterleys continued. "I don't want to bring you too deeply into this matter. All that you need do is to make your way to the English Bank, see Mr. Harrison, the manager, and tell him of your fruitless visit to me. He will give you a letter to my wife and will know what other steps to take."
"Is that all?" Richard asked, a little disappointed. "You don't anticipate any scrapping, or anything of that sort?"
"I don't know what to anticipate," Hunterleys confessed, a little wearily. "Things are moving fast now towards the climax. I promise I'll come to you for help if I need it. You can but refuse."
"No fear of my refusing," Richard declared heartily. "Not on your life, sir!"