But at Newhaven he had found no answer—Harris, in fact, not having received the telegram, having already inflicted his stab, and fled the Palace.
Whereupon O'Hara, in an agony of doubt, had telegraphed Frankl from Newhaven:
“For God's sake find Harris. Make him meet me at Croydon to-night in the 9.45 from Newhaven. Do not fail”.
Now, Frankl knew exactly where Harris was—hiding in the Market Street house. And he said to himself: “All right: it's got something to do with money, and a lot of it, too, with all this 'God's sake'. Suppose we both go to Croydon?”
Hence Frankl missed the joy of seeing the Regent mobbed: for at 9.30 he was waiting with Harris on the Croydon up-platform.
And as the train stopped, they two hurried into the compartment where O'Hara sat alone.
“You, my friend?” said O'Hara to Frankl.
“Large as life”, replied Frankl: “I and the boy have already made it up between us for a third each: you a third, I a third, Alfie a third: that's fair; I keep the police off the backs of the pair of you, and you pay me a third. What's the figure?”
In one moment of silence O'Hara plotted; then his tongue yielded to the temptation of the great words: “Eight-hundred-and-fifty thousand, sir”.
So after three minutes' talk Harris got out, and, as the train started, sprang into a first-class compartment in which was one other occupant.