"Superstition pure and simple," Peter confessed, taking his key from the office. "It doesn't alter anything. I am fatalist enough to shrug my shoulders and move on. But I tell you, Sogrange," he added, after a moment's pause, "I wouldn't admit it to anyone else in the world, but I am afraid of Bernadine. I have had the best of it so often. It can't last. In all we've had twelve encounters. The next will be the thirteenth."
Sogrange shrugged his shoulders slightly as he rang for the lift.
"I'd propose you for the Thirteen Club, only there's some uncomfortable clause about yearly suicides which might not suit you," he remarked.
"Good night, and don't dream of Bernadine and your thirteenth encounter."
"I only hope," Peter murmured, "that I may be in a position to dream after it!"
CHAPTER IX
THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN
Baron de Grost glanced at the card which his butler had brought in to him, carelessly at first, afterwards with that curious rigidity of attention which usually denotes the setting free of a flood of memories.
"The gentleman would like to see you, sir," the man announced.