“Oh! that’s quite foolish. He must go, if it is really in his interests.”
“Exactly,” declared Adam. “I have all my life been looking for such a chance to make money, and it has at last arrived. He must go.”
“Most certainly. I will urge him strongly.”
“A word from you, Miss Rolfe, would decide him—but—well, don’t you think it would be best if you did not tell him that we had met. He might not like it if he knew we had discussed his business affairs—eh?”
“Very well,” she said. “I will say nothing. When he speaks to me about the suggested journey I will strongly advise him to go in his own interests.”
“Yes; do. It will be the means of putting many thousands of pounds into both our pockets. The matter is, in fact, entirely in your hands. May I with safety leave it there?”
“With perfect safety, Mr Adam,” was her reply. “It is, perhaps, fortunate that we should have met like this to-night.”
“Fortunate!” he echoed. “Most fortunate for all of us. If you are really Mr Barclay’s friend you will see that he goes with me.”
“I am his friend, and he shall go if it is to his interest to do go.”
“Ask him, and he will tell you,” was the reply of the man who had lounged in Park Lane as a shabby stranger, and of whom old Sam Statham went in such deadly fear.