Anstruther intimated that it was all the same to him. He knew perfectly well now that the whole thing was exploded. There was something bitter in the reflection that he had been found out at last and laid by the heels over so paltry a business as the bogus burglary at the City and Provincial Bank.
"I think I'll walk," he said. "No, you need not call any of your men, and you need have no fear of personal violence."
"All right," Bates said. "Though I am still suffering from the shaking up you gave me last night. Come along."
"I must apologize for all this trouble," Anstruther said, turning to Claire, and speaking in quite his natural manner. "I must leave you to manage as best you can for the present. I dare say you will be able to manage with Serena."
He turned curtly on his heel, and walked to the door. Of Jack he took no notice whatever. A moment later the front door closed sullenly, and Anstruther was gone.
"The house smells all the sweeter for his absence," Jack said. "My dearest girl, you can see now what a narrow escape you have had. I only hope, for your sake, that the fellow has not been tampering with your fortune. You must not stay here after to-morrow. The place will be simply besieged by newspaper reporters and interviewers. I must find some house for you----"
"You need not trouble about that, Mr. Masefield," Serena said. "There is one house where both of us will be welcomed with open arms. Need I say that I am alluding to Lady Barmouth's?"
Jack gave a sigh of relief; for the moment he had quite forgotten Lady Barmouth. At any rate, for to-night Claire and Serena could stay where they were, and they could go to Lady Barmouth's in the morning. Then Jack remembered all that Serena had gone through, and warmly congratulated her upon the recovery of her boy. "It means all the world to me," Serena cried. "It fell out exactly as Miss Helmsley said it would. When that man called to see Mr. Anstruther again, I told him who I was, and he took me to my child at once. The stranger had been very kind to the lad. He knew nothing of the rascality and villainy behind it all, and he was only too glad to see mother and son united."
"And Padini?" Jack suggested. "You must not forget----"
"I want to forget everything about him," Serena cried. "I shall be glad, really glad, to know that that man is outside the power of doing mischief for the next three years. Do not ask me anything else--do not ask me, for instance, why I was playing the deaf-mute that night at Carrington's rooms. I don't know. I was a mere slave and tool in Anstruther's hands, and had to do exactly as he told me. It was only by the merest accident that I discovered how the trick of the music was done, and that I should have had to have kept to myself if my dear boy had not been so marvelously restored to me. Perhaps at some future time, I may be disposed to tell you more. For the present, all I want to do is to sleep. I am longing for that one night's sweet repose which has been so cruelly denied to me the last few years."