And Tubby, his red face much redder even than usual, grew maudlin over the champagne and the thoughts of the delights which awaited him until at last grief assailed him, and he nearly wept as he uttered the plaint of all the ages, "Sho much fun livin', it's shame to think we're goin' die."
CHAPTER XVIII
[Fate is Fickle]
In the dim light of the early summer dawn Marshall Hamilton paced restlessly to and fro across his study floor. He had returned from the pursuit of Stoat to find that Helen had summoned Doctor Rowland, the local physician, and had herself superintended the removal of Atherton's body to the room left vacant by Bellingham. Shortly afterward, the doctor had arrived, and although at a first cursory examination he had shaken his head ominously, he was now engaged in a more careful study of the patient's injuries, to see if human skill could restore to life the flame which alternately seemed to flicker, and then to subside, in the breast of the erstwhile chauffeur.
Yet it was not of the injured man that Marshall Hamilton was thinking, for though he realized that it was to Atherton's bravery that he owed his daughter's life, yet long years in the atmosphere of high finance had so accustomed him to viewing the world in its immensity that outside the scope of his own immediate family he had gradually become a man of no emotions whatsoever. Mankind, to him, meant no longer the isolated individual, but a vast, teeming mass of habits, customs, tendencies; interesting, if studied in the bulk; wearisome and insignificant, if reduced to a single microcosm. And Atherton, therefore, was no more to him than any other pawn in the game; this pawn had saved his Queen, and that was all.
But with regard to the banker's own affairs, so strangely disturbed by this mysterious sequence of events which had threatened the system of which he was the chief, here the situation was disconcerting in the extreme. Only once before, in the twenty years of his leadership, had there been room even for a suspicion that their secret was in danger, and then, without waiting to discover whether or not these suspicions were well founded, the man who had been the occasion of them had suddenly disappeared, and everything had continued as before. But this recent chain of incidents had been infinitely more alarming, for there had been a cohesion between them which seemed to indicate not the haphazard gropings of a single individual, but the concerted effort of a group of bold and intelligent men.
To be sure, the attempt of McKay's chauffeur to follow his employer had not caused them any great anxiety. Precautions, of course, had been taken; among others, the placing of detectives at the houses of both McKay and Hamilton; but no further trouble had been anticipated, and the discovery by one of the detectives that Bellingham was secretly working over the tape had come as an unwelcome shock, for the incident of the chauffeur and the labors of the secretary had been so closely connected in point of time that it seemed improbable that they could have been merely a coincidence. And although, in the case of Bellingham, further investigation might perhaps have shown that the secretary was merely one of the many innocuous "chart fiends," and that there was nothing sinister in his study of the tape, this possibility was strongly negatived by Bellingham's sudden flight, an event which had necessitated his murder upon the very eve of his departure from the country. And here, with this double tragedy, the banker had confidently expected the disturbance to cease, instead of which had ensued, with almost incredible boldness, the events of the night, and the endeavor, within an ace of being successful, at capturing the cypher which held the key to the seemingly purposeless fluctuations of the stock market. Thus the banker was most profoundly disturbed. By what possible chance the secret could have been fathomed--how the impregnable defence of forty years had all at once been beaten down--was wholly incomprehensible. And yet, grave as the situation was, there was still much for which to be thankful. For if Atherton's bullet had not gone to its mark, and the marauder had escaped with the watch, there might easily have resulted a scandal which would have shaken the country from one end to the other. But as it was, it appeared that although by the narrowest of margins they had managed to escape, and the next task was to be on the alert to see whether more attempts would be made, or whether this, as he most devoutly hoped, would be the last.
A knock at the door aroused him, and the imperturbable Martin stood aside to admit Doctor Howland, gray-haired, a trifle bent, but still a hale and vigorous man.
"Well," asked Mr. Hamilton, "how do you find him?"
"He's badly off," the doctor answered. "There's no doubt about that. He is still unconscious, and his heart action is distinctly unfavorable. In fact, Mr. Hamilton, to put it bluntly, I should say that he is at the point of death. Your daughter is still with him; she has been most helpful; but I have sent for a nurse, who will come at once. We will do all we can, and of course, if you say the word, there are other men whom you cay call in consultation. Charles Carrington, for instance, has done wonders in these cases, and Kennedy is good, also, though of the two, I believe Carrington is the more skillful."