Julian’s life for the last month had been lived at that high pressure which is only produced in a man by the consciousness that he has burnt his ships. Every shilling that he had accumulated during the previous six months was invested in the scheme propounded to him a month ago by Marston Loring; and the history of his real life during the interval would have been a history of the stages through which that scheme had passed. The affairs of the Welcome Diamond Mining Company had followed precisely the course indicated by Loring during that first interview on the subject between Loring, Ramsay, and Julian. Shortly after that interview “Welcomes” had fallen to a nominal price; they had then been bought up according to arrangement. A slight rise had followed as a matter of course, followed by an interval of vacillation, and a slow succession of trifling advances, which had again been succeeded by a period of quiet.
So far the excitement with which every hour had been instinct for Julian had been the excitement of preparation solely; the ground had been tilled and the seed sown. And what that soil was in which he had sown his seed; what were the characteristics that were to prove so stimulating; it was not in him to consider. He was perfectly well aware of the nature of the transaction in which he was engaged; he had understood at the outset that the “private information received from the Cape” on which the shares were to be bought up was a “put up thing,” as he would have expressed it, between Ramsay and Marston Loring; and the knowledge affected him not at all. That black thread in the warp of his character was running strong and deep now, and to such considerations his sensibilities were absolutely dormant.
“Well?” The monosyllable broke from him eager and impetuous, as though it contained the pent-up suspense and excitement of hours. He had come up rapidly to Loring’s side, and the latter, without lifting his eyes, signed to an evening paper which lay on the table as he said briefly:
“All right!”
Julian’s face turned quite white; he snatched up the paper and turned with breathless eagerness to the column devoted to the money market.
“Welcome Diamond Company Shares.”
The blue eyes seemed to leap at the line and fasten on it with a hungry avidity pitiful to see, and he stood there gazing at it with glittering, fascinated eyes, with a curious stillness upon him from head to foot, as though all remembrance of his actual surroundings, all thought even of Loring, had faded. Nearly five minutes had passed when Loring laid down his pen and leant back in his chair, turning a little that he might fix his eyes on Julian as he stood rather behind him.
“Pretty fair?” he said carelessly.
Julian lifted his eyes from the paper and turned his white face to Loring. He nodded as though the feelings of the moment were not to be put into speech, and then the slow, deep colour of excitement began to creep over his features.
“Have you seen Ramsay?” he said in a low, quick voice.