“I’ll see him in one moment,” he exclaimed, glancing at the card, and the youth withdrew.
Leaning back in his chair his face assumed a heavy, thoughtful expression.
“It’s a crooked bit of business at best,” he said, aloud to himself, “but the money is bequeathed in legal form, duly signed and witnessed; therefore, as far as I can see, nobody can prove to the contrary. I was rather apprehensive of the results, but, there—I suppose it was merely an absurd fancy.”
He touched the gong beside him, and almost immediately Victor Bérard, his face wreathed in smiles and wearing a gardenia in his coat, was ushered in.
“So the preliminaries have been carried out satisfactorily,” exclaimed the solicitor, as he motioned his client to a seat opposite him.
“Yes—so far,” he answered in excellent English.
“Ah! I read the account in the papers, and saw at once you had had a hand in the matter.”
“Your shrewdness scarcely astonishes me, mon copain,” replied Victor, with a laugh, “especially when you knew that our exchequer was almost at vanishing point, and that we had decided on repeating the little ruse that has proved so remunerative formerly. We have worked à coup perdu, and, of course, all in the interest of the grand scheme.”
“On this occasion there was no hitch, I suppose?”
“None. There is not even a shadow of suspicion,” he replied, dropping into a whisper. “The body, when discovered upon the rails half an hour after we had left the train, was scarcely recognisable. The post-mortem revealed that the dead man had been drinking heavily, and the intelligent jury have this morning returned a verdict of accidental death. Here’s the Globe—just out. Read for yourself.”