I did not hear more of Klein for some fifteen days, at the end of which time he wrote saying that Hermann Rudisic was with him at Basingstoke; and that they hoped to call upon me on the following Friday. The march of events was from that time quick. On the Thursday I read in a daily paper of an accident in Berkshire to a Chilian visitor, who had been thrown from his carriage and seriously hurt. The account said that his life was despaired of, and that he was then lying at the house of his host, the well-known Colonel Kershaw Klein, who had taken Lord Aberly's place, the Woodfields. On the Friday morning I received a long letter from the Colonel deploring the accident and the delay, more especially because his commission to purchase the stone extended only to the 10th of August, and it was then the third. He hoped, however, that matters would look brighter at the end of that time; and would bring his partner to London the moment he could travel.
Now, at the first thought, this intelligence set all the inherent suspicion, which is a part of me, at work once more. Suggestions of doubt rose again and again, instantly to be suppressed. Had I not satisfied myself completely as to the Colonel's standing, his means, his reputation, and his personal character? Was he not staying in Lord Aberly's house? Had not he passed most brilliantly through a London season? Were there not twenty members of the Bachelors' Club seeking to pay for the sake of his daughter the fine imposed upon amorous backsliders? If one were to suspect every man with such credentials as these, the sooner one shut one's door, and locked one's safe for good, the better for all hope of doing business. Of all this I was certain; and had already come to the determination to put from my mind suspicion both of the Count and his daughter, when there came to me by the afternoon delivery another letter concerning the matter; but this was anonymous, and in a hand I did not know. It was a curious scrawl written upon a slip of account paper, and its contents were but these words:—
"You will be asked to Kershaw Klein's house in three days. I told you the other morning not to trust yourself with the man; I say now, accept the invitation."
This was plainly from my friend of Hyde Park; and I confess that his pompous mysteriousness and pretence of knowledge amused me. Even he no longer complained of Colonel Klein's reputation, nor advised me now to avoid him. His letter finally quieted my scruples, and from that moment I resolved to dally with them no longer; and to let no silly fears delay the negotiations for the sale of the treasure of White Creek.
In this resolution I waited rather anxiously for the coming of Klein and his partner, but three days went, and I saw nothing of them; it being on the Monday morning at eleven o'clock that the former drove up to Bond Street in a single brougham, and came with his daughter into my private office. He seemed in a great state of distress, saying that Rudisic, although better, was still unable to set foot to the ground: and begging me as the time was so short to take the great jewel to Berkshire—his house was just across the line dividing the county from Hampshire—and there to settle the matter that very day. I heard him mechanically; my eyes glued on the exquisite picture which his daughter made; her gown of white delaine showing the mature contour of her figure admirably; and her deep brown hair rolling from the shelter of a great straw hat in silken waves upon her shoulders. If she had fascinated me at the dance, the fascination was intensified there. I would cheerfully have risked the best parcel of rubies in the place to have had the pleasure of keeping her in the office even for an hour; and I did not hesitate one moment in accepting Klein's offer.
"Come down to-day," said he, "and bring your man with you in case we don't do business, and you have to return alone. I don't like mailing with big stuff on me; you never know who gets wind of it. I suppose you have somebody you could take."
Even with the girl's eyes upon me and her laughing threat to "make me tramp at tennis awhile," I had a measure of satisfaction in this request, and thought instantly of Abel.
"Yes," said I, with a light laugh, "I will bring my own detective. He's down below now."
"That's right," said Klein, "and we'll catch the two-forty from Waterloo. I've ordered the carriage to meet that, and there's just time for a snack between whiles. Never forget your food, sir—I don't for all the business in Europe. I once lost a commission for a railway in Venezuela through a sandwich—but there, that's another story, and I'll tell it you over a chop at the Criterion. I guess I've got an appetite on, and so's Margaret, eh, little girl?"
He slapped his chest to signify that a void was there; and we all went off down Piccadilly, returning afterwards for the gem which I had placed in a flat-velvet case. I put it into my jewel pocket, cunningly contrived in my vest, and with no more delay we got to Waterloo and to our saloon, Abel traveling second class, by the bye, and in another compartment. There was a well-turned-out wagonette to meet us when we reached Basingstoke; and after a drive of something under an hour through some of that glorious pine scenery of southern Berkshire, we entered a short drive edged by thick laurels, and were shortly at the gate of the Woodfields. Of the exterior of the house I saw nothing, for, as I descended from the wagonette, I chanced to catch the eye of the footman, who had a finger to his lips; and an exclamation almost broke from my lips. Notwithstanding his disguise I recognized the man in a moment. He was the "Oxford youth" who had given me a cigar in the park on the morning after the dance in Grosvenor Crescent.