CHAPTER XI
AN UNFORTUNATE MOMENT FOR THE DOCTOR
The morning after the second card party found Banks and Rayton eating an early breakfast with good appetites. If Rayton felt uneasy, face and manner showed nothing of it. The big New Yorker was in the highest spirits. He had found an unfamiliar sport—a new form of hunting—a twisted, mysterious trail, with the Lord knows what at the far end of it. He was alert, quiet, smiling to himself. He ate five rashers of bacon, drank three cups of coffee, and then lit a cigar.
"I'll have my finger on him within the week," he said, leaning back in his chair.
The Englishman glanced up at him, and smiled.
"I do not think we should encourage the idiot by paying any further attention to his silly tricks," he said. "Whoever he is, let him see that he does not amuse or interest any one but himself. Then he'll get tired and drop it. The whole thing is absolute foolishness, and the man at the bottom of it is a fool."
"I mean to trail him, and pin him down, fool or no fool," replied Banks. "I'll make him pay dear for his fooling, by thunder! He is having his fun—and I mean to have mine."
Rayton laughed. "Go ahead and have your fun, old chap; but I tell you that the more notice you pay his silly tricks, the more you tickle his vanity."
"I'll tickle more than his vanity before I'm done with him," promised Banks.