“Be my guest next Tuesday,” the editor persisted. “I’m toastmaster and the subject is ‘Crime in Fiction.’ I told the boys I’d get you to speak if I possibly could. I’m counting on you. Will you do it?”
It seemed a deliciously ironical thing. Here was an honest editor asking the friend he did not know to be a master criminal to make an address on crime in fiction. Trent laughed the noiseless laugh he had cultivated in place of the one that was in reality the expression of himself. The editor thought it a good sign.
“Who are the other speakers?” Trent demanded.
“Oppenheim Phelps for one. He’s over here on a visit. His specialty is high-grade international spy stuff, as you know. E. W. Hornung would be the man to have if we could get him, but that’s impossible. I’ve got half a dozen others, but Phelps and you will be the drawing cards.”
“Put me down,” Trent said genially, “but introduce me as a back number almost out of touch with things but willing to oblige a pal.” He laughed again his noiseless laugh.
Crosbeigh looked at him meditatively. Certainly Anthony Trent was changed. In the old days, before he came into Australian money, he was at times jocund with the fruitful grape, a good fellow, a raconteur, one who had been popular at school and college and liked to stand well with his fellows. But now, Crosbeigh reflected, he was changed. There was a certain suspicion about him, a lack of trust in men’s motives. It was the attitude no doubt which wealth brought. The moneyless man can meet a borrower cheerfully and need cudgel his mind for no other excuse than his poverty.
Crosbeigh was certain Trent had a lot of money for the reason he had actually refused four cents a word for what he had previously received only two cents. But the editor admired his old contributor and was glad to see him again.
“I’m going to spring a surprise on you,” Crosbeigh declared, “and I’m willing to bet you’ll enjoy it.”
“I hope so,” Trent returned, idly, and little dreamed what lay before him.
The dinner was at a chop house and the food no worse than the run of city restaurants. Anthony Trent, who had fared delicately for some time, put up with the viands readily enough for the pleasure of being again among men of the craft which had been his own.