“It is all up,” he said. “They have found the books; they have understood them; and they are wrecking the place.”
“They are quite welcome to do that,” said Cornish. Mr. Wade, who was always business-like, had reopened his writing-case when he saw Roden, and now came forward to hand him a written paper.
“That is a copy,” he said, “of the telegram we have sent to Creil. He can come here and select what men he wants—the steady ones and the skilled workmen. With each man we will hand him a cheque in trust. The others can take their money—and go.”
“And drink themselves to death as expeditiously as they think fit,” added Cornish, the philanthropist—the fashionable drawing-room champion of the masses.
“I got back here through the Wood,” said Percy Roden, who was still breathless, as if he had been hurrying. “One of them, a Swede, came to warn me. They are looking for me in the town—a hundred and twenty of them, and not one who cares that”—he paused, and gave a snap of the fingers—“for his life or the law. Both railway stations are watched, and all the steam-boat stations on the canals; they will kill me if they catch me.”
His eyes wavered, for there is nothing more terrifying than the avowed hostility of a mass of men, and no law grimmer than lynch-law. Yet he held up his head with a sort of pride in his danger—some touch of that subtle sense of personal distinction which seems to reach the heart of the victim of an accident, or of a prisoner in the dock.
“If I had not met that Swede I should have gone on to the works, and they would have pulled me to pieces there,” continued Roden. “I do not know how I am to get away from The Hague, or where I shall be safe in the whole world; but the money is at Hamburg and Antwerp. The money is safe enough.”
He gave a laugh and threw back his head. His hearers looked at him, and Mr. Wade alone understood his thoughts. For the banker had dealt with money-makers all his life and knew that to many men, money is a god, and the mere possession of it dearer to them than life itself.
“If you stay here, in my room upstairs,” said Cornish, “I will go down to the works now. And this evening I will try and get you away from The Hague—and from Europe.”
“And I will go to the Villa des Dunes again,” added Dorothy, “and pack your things.”