"I can keep the man's mouth closed for a certain time," he said, "but sooner or later he will blab it out, and once the police get on the track——" Again he shrugged his shoulders.
Meriel was more than ever amazed at the Jew's attitude. She let some of her surprise escape in speech.
"You, knowing where some of your valuables are, are willing to forego all chance of their recovery, to let the—the thief—go unpunished? You who everybody says had determined to spend the whole of the rest of your life on the recovery."
The Jew spread out the palms of his hands in a characteristically racial gesture.
"The rest of my life," he said. "My life would have been ended yesterday but for Mr. Guy Hora. Strange as it may seem, life is very good in my eyes. I might never have known how good but for my accident. It was slipping away and he gave it back to me. That was a debt which I must repay. Miss Challys, never yet have I failed to meet every obligation that I have incurred. Ask Christian or Jew who has ever had dealings with me if Hildebrand Flurscheim has ever failed to take up his bond when it became due."
She murmured something about the nobility of his attitude, but he would not accept any such complimentary description.
"It is just my business point of view," he remarked drily. "Suppose I put the value of the pictures at fifty thousand pounds. Personally I would give double that amount for my life, though I should very much doubt whether anybody else would give as many pence."
Laughter and tears strove for mastery in her face.
"You have greatly relieved my mind, Mr. Flurscheim," she said softly. "Though I shall never see Mr. Hora again, yet I—I could not bear to think of him in prison."
"You had better see him again, and quickly, too, if you want to keep him out of it," snapped the Jew promptly in response. "It will want a woman's hand to do that, and from what I have observed you are about the only person in the world who has half a chance of succeeding."