“If you get the right person,” said his patroness, “she may be a pleasant companion for my trusted little Mary.”
When he had raised the lady’s hand to his lips and departed he realized how sternly he was being kept out of her real councils. Even the vainest fool could not have deceived himself.
“It’s the payment of money, the changing of coin between us, that simply makes me only an upper servant,” he snarled.
“Once that money passes between man and woman, in any relation, there is an end of any free will. But, I can wait. And, you shall pay me, Madame, to the uttermost, when you are in my power.”
He knew the probable magnitude of the transactions and, even his iron nerve was shaken.
“It cannot be merely herself, it is the grouped official cowards behind her, who are making money on the sly.”
He found a new surprise awaiting him at his rooms, one which brought the blood to his heart with a sudden surge. There was a bunch of red roses awaiting him with a sealed note. He knew not the handwriting, but, his eyes gleamed with a strange fire as he read:
“The Lady of the Red Rose will visit you at ten to-morrow night. Remember your promise. Fail not. She will be veiled and dressed in black. Be alone. And, at your door, at ten.”
“They are all the same,” he gasped, with a wildly beating heart, “under the rose, lurks always some wild intrigue, some desperate game.
“Life in New York is only a game of catch who catch can.”