“Do you intend to take the oils and the rug and later return them?” demanded Jane.
“Absolutely! That’s the whole story. Only Cleigh here will not believe it until the rug and oils are dumped on the door-step of his New York home. I needed money. Nobody would offer to finance a chart with a red cross on it. So I had to work it out in my own fashion. The moment Eisenfeldt sees these oils and the rug he becomes my financier, but he’ll never put his claw on them except for one thing—that act of God they mention on the back of your ticket. Some raider may 234 have poked into this lagoon of mine. In that case Eisenfeldt wins.”
Cleigh smiled.
“A pretty case, Cunningham, but it won’t hold water. It is inevitable that Eisenfeldt gets the rug and the paintings, and you are made comfortable for the rest of your days. A shabby business, and you shall rue it.”
“My word?”
“I don’t believe in it any longer,” returned Cleigh.
Cunningham appealed to Jane.
“Give me the whole story, then I’ll tell you what I believe,” she said. “You may be telling the truth.”
What a queer idea—wanting his word believed! Why should it matter to him whether they believed in the honour of his word or not, when he held the whip hand and could act as he pleased? The poor thing! And as that phrase was uttered in thought, the glamour of him was dissipated; she saw Cunningham as he was, a poor benighted thing, half boy, half demon, a thing desperately running away from his hurt and lashing out at friends and enemies alike on the way.
“Tell your story—all of it.”