And he stood committed, on pain of assassination, to aid and abet in the palming off of bogus bonds on the Bank of England!
[CHAPTER II—On Board the St. Paul]
The St. Paul sped eastwards across the summer sea, and surely of all the human hopes and fears carried by the great liner those locked in the breast of the new Duke were the most momentous. To gain a little breathing time, he had booked his passage as plain Charles Hanbury. In the brief interval before sailing he had seen no more of Jevons, but he guessed that that shrewd practitioner would have watched him, or had him watched, on board, even if there was not a spy upon him among his fellow-passengers; and he wished to let it be inferred that his voyage was undertaken solely in observance of the compact made in the Bowery dive.
For as yet he was by no means certain of his attitude towards that compact. It was true that the cast-off wastrel of two days ago was now one of the premier peers of England, hastening home to take possession of his fortune and estates. But where was the good of being a duke if you were to be a dead duke? he argued with a cynicism bred of his misfortunes rather than innate. There had been a genuine ring about the proposal of Jevons that left no doubt as to the reality of the menace held out; the man's reluctance in broaching the penalty of desertion carried conviction that it was no mere flower of speech.
On the whole, the Duke was inclined to call on the arch rogue at the Hotel Cecil before incurring a risk that might render his dukedom a transitory possession. Then, if the part he was expected to play proved to be within his powers and without much chance of detection, he might still elect to play it, and so enjoy in security his hereditary privileges.
It will be seen that the seventh Duke of Beaumanoir was not troubled with moral scruples, and that the principle of noblesse oblige had no place as yet in his somewhat seared philosophy. It was enough for the moment that he had gained something worth having and keeping, and he meant to have it and keep it by the most efficacious method. Whether that method would prove to be connivance in a gigantic crime or the denouncement of the latter to Scotland Yard could only be decided by a personal interview with the mysterious Ziegler. Yes, he would pay that visit to the Hotel Cecil, at any rate, and be guided by what passed there as to his future course of action.
"A penny for your thoughts, Mr. Hanbury," said a gay voice at his elbow, as on the third day of the voyage he leaned over the rail of the promenade deck and ruminated on his dilemma. Wheeling round he looked down into the laughing eyes of a girl, a very dainty and charming girl, who sat next him at the saloon table. No formal introduction had taken place between them, for lack of mutual friends; but he had learned from the card designating her place at table that she was Miss Leonie Sherman, and it is to be presumed that she had gathered his name in the same way.
"I will earn that penny," he said with mock gravity. "I was debating how far one might legitimately carry the principle of doing evil that good might come."
It was a strange answer to make to a shipboard acquaintance of three days, and Miss Sherman regarded him with a newly awakened interest.
"It depends," she said, "whether the good is to accrue to yourself or to other people."