“Jim, we’re going back to town to-night,” Gray said. “If anybody calls I’m in Paris. But I don’t expect that anyone will. Tell that to your wife, and to-morrow go over to Pangbourne, stay at the Elephant Hotel there, and find out what is doing concerning young Homfray. He’s at the Cottage Hospital there. You know all the facts.”
“All right!” replied the clean-shaven old butler, whose aristocratic appearance always bore him in such good stead. He often posed as a benevolent philanthropist, and could impose upon most people. His was a long criminal record at Parkhurst and Sing-Sing, and he was a man who, having spent nearly half his life in jail, had brought crookdom to a fine art, truly a worthy associate of Gordon Gray, alias Gordon Tresham, Ralph Fane, Major Hawes Jackson, Commander Tothill, R.N., and a dozen other names which had risen and faded upon the phosphorescence of his elusive life.
Gordon Gray lived—and he lived well—at other people’s expense. He had caught the habit of hanging on to the edge of the wealthy man’s garment, and wealthy war-profiteers were, he found, so very easily gulled when they wanted to get on, and by political manoeuvring to make their wives titled “ladies.”
The fact was that Gordon Gray was a dealer in big things. Trumpery theft, burglary or suchlike offences, were beneath him. He could manipulate big deals in the City, could “arrange” a knighthood at a price, and sometimes, when he and Freda had suddenly arrived in London from New York, he would actually entertain English politicians with names of world-wide repute at elaborate dinners at the Ritz.
Though a crook he was a philosopher, and his favourite remark when things went badly was: “Bah! it is no use blowing against the wind!”
That night he felt himself blowing against the wind. Though he said nothing to the handsome woman at his side, he regretted that Roddy Homfray had not been placed in the river Thames as he had first suggested, instead of upon the bank opposite that beautiful riverside house with its glorious lawns and gardens at the other side of Whitchurch Bridge. If Roddy’s unconscious form had been pitched over the bank it would have been found down at Mapledurham, and believed to be a case of suicide. He had been a fool, he declared within himself. He had hoped that the young man would be found dead in the morning. But he had not!
“I’ll go over to Pangbourne,” said the elderly man he had addressed so familiarly as Jim. “And I’ll report all I can gather. Anything else?” he asked, crossing to a box of cigars and helping himself without being invited.
“No. Get back here. And tell your wife to keep the wireless securely locked up. There’s a Yale lock on this door. Nobody comes in. You hear!”
“Of course. It wouldn’t do, Gordon, would it? That wireless is going to be a big use to us in the near future, eh?” laughed the white-haired old man.
“It will be, if we’re cute. But we shall have to have our eyes skinned. Have you paid all the tradesmen’s books?”