POPULAR NOVELS

BY

EDGAR WALLACE

PUBLISHED BY

Ward, Lock & Co., Limited

In various editions

MR. JUSTICE

MAXELL

BY

EDGAR WALLACE

WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED

LONDON AND MELBOURNE

Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd., Frome and London

Mr. Justice Maxell

CHAPTER I

IT was two hours after the muezzin had called to evening prayer, and night had canopied Tangier with a million stars. In the little Sok, the bread-sellers sat cross-legged behind their wares, their candles burning steadily, for there was not so much as the whisper of a wind blowing. The monotonous strumming of a guitar from a Moorish café, the agonised barlak! of a belated donkey-driver bringing his charge down the steep streets which lead to the big bazaar, the shuffle of bare feet on Tangier’s cobbles, and the distant hush-hush of the rollers breaking upon the amber shore—these were the only sounds which the night held.

John Maxell sat outside the Continental Café, in the condition of bodily content which a good dinner induces. Mental content should have accompanied such a condition, but even the memory of a perfect dinner could not wholly obliterate a certain uneasiness of mind. He had been uneasy when he came to Tangier, and his journey through France and Spain had been accompanied by certain apprehensions and doubts which Cartwright had by no means dispelled.

Rather, by his jovial evasions, his cheery optimism, and at times his little irritable outbreaks of temper, he had given the eminent King’s Counsel further cause for disquiet.

Cartwright sat at the other side of the table, and was unusually quiet. This was a circumstance which was by no means displeasing to Maxell, for the night was not conducive to talk. There are in Northern Africa many nights like this, when one wishes to sit in dead silence and let thought take its own course, unchecked and untrammelled. In Morocco such nights are common and, anyway, Maxell had always found it difficult to discuss business matters after dinner.

Cartwright had no temperament and his quiet was due to other causes. It was he who broke the silence, knocking out his pipe on the iron-topped table with a clang which jarred his more sensitive companion to the very spine.

“I’d stake my life and my soul on there being a reef,” he said with a suddenness which was almost as jarring. “Why, you’ve seen the outcrop for yourself, and isn’t it exactly the same formation as you see on the Rand?”

Maxell nodded.

Though a common-law man, he had been associated in mining cases and had made a very careful study of the whole problem of gold extraction.

“It looks right enough to me,” he said, “but as against that we have the fact that some clever engineers have spent a great deal of time and money trying to locate the reef. That there is gold in Morocco everybody knows, and I should say, Cartwright, that you are right. But where is the reef? It would cost a fortune to bore, even though we had the other borings to guide us.”

The other made an impatient noise.

“Of course, if the reef were all mapped out it would be a simple matter, but then we shouldn’t get on to it, as we are to-day, at the cost of a few thousands. Hang it all, Maxell, we’ve got to take a certain amount of risk! I know it’s a gamble quite as well as you. There’s no sense in arguing that point with me. But other things are gambles too. Law was a gamble to you for many years, and a bigger gamble after you took silk.”

This was a sore point with Maxell, as the other knew. A prosperous junior, he had been called within the Bar, and taken upon himself the function and style of King’s Counsellor in the hope that his prosperity would still further be expanded. And, like so many other men, he had discovered that the successful junior is not necessarily the successful K.C.

Fortunately for him, he had long before contested and won a seat in Parliament, and his service to the Government of the day had to some extent ensured his future. But, financially, he had suffered considerably.

“No,” he said, “silk isn’t any great catch to a man, I agree; and it was certainly a gamble, and a losing gamble.”

“Which reminds me,” said Cartwright, “there was a talk, before I left London, that you would be given Cabinet rank.”

Maxell laughed.

“It is extremely unlikely,” he said. “Anyway, if they make me Solicitor-General, that doesn’t carry Cabinet rank.”

“It carries a lot of money,” said Cartwright after a pause for a moment, “and it’s money that counts just now, Maxell.”

Again the lawyer nodded.

He might have added that, but for the need for money, he would long since have dropped his association with Alfred Cartwright, though Cartwright’s name stood very high in certain circles of the City of London. They had been at school together, though in that period there had been no very great friendship between them. And Cartwright was marked out for success from the beginning. He inherited a considerable business when his father died, and he enlarged and improved upon it. He had taken up a hundred and one outside interests, and had made most of them pay. A few of them did not pay, and it was whispered that the losses upon his failures took a considerable slice of the balance that accrued from his successes.

They had met again when Maxell was a junior and Cartwright the defendant in a case which, had he lost, would have made him some thirty thousand pounds the poorer. When Maxell thought back upon that event, he had to confess that it was not a pleasant case, being one in which Cartwright had been charged with something which was tantamount to misrepresentation; and, although he had won, and won brilliantly, he had never felt any great pride in his achievement.

“No,” he said (the pauses were frequent and long), “I should hardly imagine that the Prime Minister loves me to that extent. In Parliament you have to be an uncomfortable quantity to be really successful. You must be strong enough to have a national following, and sufficiently independent to keep the Whips guessing. I am known as a safe man, and I hold a safe seat, which I couldn’t lose if I tried. That doesn’t make for promotion. Of course, I could have had an Under-Secretaryship for the asking, and that means a couple of thousand a year, but it also means that you last out the life of the administration in a subordinate capacity, and that, by the time you have made good, your party is in the cold shade of opposition, and there are no jobs going.”

He shook his head, and returned immediately to the question of the missing reef, as though he wished to take the subject from his own personal affairs.

“You say that it would cost us a lot of money if the reef was proved,” he said. “Isn’t it costing us a lot now?”

Cartwright hesitated.

“Yes, it is. As a matter of fact,” he confessed, “the actual reef is costing nothing, or next to nothing, because El Mograb is helping me. In our own business—that is to say, in the Syndicate—our expenses are more or less small; but I am doing a little independent buying, and that has meant the spending of money. I am taking up all the ground to the south of the Angera—a pretty expensive business.”

Maxell shifted uneasily in his chair.

“That is rather worrying me, you know, Cartwright,” he said; “your scheme is ever so much too ambitious. I was figuring it out this afternoon as I was sitting in my room, and I came to the conclusion that, if the scheme as you outlined it to me yesterday went through, it would mean your finding two millions.”

“Three,” corrected the other cheerfully, “but think what it means, Maxell! Supposing it went through. Supposing we struck a reef, and the reef continued, as I believe it will, through the country I am taking up! Why, it may mean a hundred millions to me!”

The other sighed.

“I have reached the point where I think a hundred thousand is an enormous sum,” he said. “However, you know your own business best, Cartwright. But I want to be satisfied in the matter in which we are associated together, that my liability does not exceed my power to pay. And there is another matter.”

Cartwright guessed the “other matter.”

“Well?” he asked.

“I was looking over your titles this afternoon,” said Maxell, “and I see no reference to the old Spanish working. I remember that you told me a Spaniard had taken up a considerable stretch of country and had exhausted his capital trying to prove the reef—Señor Brigot, wasn’t that his name?”

The other nodded curtly.

“A drunkard—and a bad lot,” he said. “He’s broke.”

Maxell smiled.

“His moral character doesn’t count so far as the details go; what does matter is that if your theory is correct, the reef must run through his property. What are you going to do about that?”

“Buy him out,” said the other.

He rose abruptly.

“I’m walking up to the Sok,” he said. “Come along?”

They tramped up the long, steep hill-street together, and they did not speak till they had passed through the ancient gate into the unrelieved gloom which lies outside the city.

“I don’t understand you, Maxell—you take an old man’s view of things,” said Cartwright irritably. “You’re comparatively young, you’re a good-looker. Why the devil don’t you marry, and marry money?”

Maxell laughed.

“Have you ever tried to marry money?” he asked dryly.

“No,” said the other after a pause, “but I should think it is pretty simple.”

“Try it,” said the laconic Maxell. “It is simple in books, but in real life it is next to impossible. I go about a great deal in society of all kinds, and I can tell you that I have never yet met an eligible spinster with money—that is to say, large money. I agree with you,” he went on after a while, “a man like myself should marry. And he should marry well. I could give a woman a good position, but she’s got to be the right kind of woman. There are some times when I’m just frantic about my position. I am getting older—I am forty-seven next birthday—and every day that slips past is a day lost. I ought to be married, but I can’t afford a wife. It is a blackguardly thing to talk about money in connection with marriage and yet somehow I can think of nothing else—whenever the thought arises in my mind I see an imaginary beauty sitting on a big bag of gold!” He chuckled to himself. “Let’s go back,” he said, “the big Sok always gives me the creeps.”

Something lumbered past him in the darkness, some big, overpowering beast with an unpleasant smell, and a guttural voice cried in Arabic: “Beware!”

“Camels!” said Cartwright briefly. “They’re bringing in the stuff for the morning market. The night’s young yet, Maxell. Let us go up to the theatre.”

“The theatre?” said Maxell. “I didn’t even know the theatre was open.”

“It is called theatre by courtesy,” explained Cartwright; “the inhabitants refer to it as the circus. It’s a big wooden place on the sea edge——”

“I know it, I know it,” said Maxell. “What is being played? The only people I have ever seen there have been Spanish artistes—and pretty bad artistes, too.”

“Well, there’s a treat for you. It is an English company, or rather, a variety company with a number of English turns,” said Cartwright. “We might do worse—at least, I might,” he added ominously.

When they reached the theatre they found it sparsely filled. Cartwright took one of the open boxes, and his companion settled himself into a corner to smoke. The turns were of the kind which are usually to be met with on the Levant; a tawdrily attired lady sang a humorous song in Spanish, the humour being frankly indecent. There were a juggler and a man with performing dogs, and then “Miss O’Grady” was announced.

“English,” said Cartwright, turning to the programme.

“She may even be Irish,” said Maxell dryly.

The wheezy little orchestra played a few bars and the girl came on. She was pretty—there was no doubt about that—and of a prettiness which satisfied both men. She was also British or American, for the song she sang was in a French with which both men were familiar.

“It is horrible to see an English girl in a place like this and in such company,” said Maxell.

Cartwright nodded.

“I wonder where she’s staying,” he asked, half to himself, and a contemptuous little smile curled Maxell’s lips.

“Are you going to rescue her from her infamous surroundings?” he asked, and Cartwright snapped round on him.

“I wish to heaven you wouldn’t be sarcastic, Maxell. That’s twice this evening——”

“Sorry,” said the other, snicking off the ash of his cigar. “I am in a cynical mood to-night.”

He raised his hands to applaud the girl as she bowed herself from the stage, and glanced round the house. Three boxes away was a small party of men, whom he judged were the sons of prosperous members of the Spanish colony. Their fingers flashed with diamonds, their cigarettes burnt from jewelled holders. Cartwright followed the direction of the other’s eyes.

“She’s made a hit, that Miss O’Grady,” he said. “These fellows will be tumbling over one another to present her with verbal bouquets. I wonder where she lives!” he said again.

Presently the young men rose in a body and left the box, and Cartwright grinned.

“Do you mind hanging on here whilst I go outside?”

“Not a bit,” said the other. “Where are you off to? To find out where she lives?”

“There you go again,” grumbled Cartwright. “I think Tangier makes you liverish.”

When he had got to the promenade, the men had disappeared, but a question directed to the head attendant revealed, as he had expected, the objective of the little party at the stage door.

The stage door was reached from the outside of the theatre and involved a journey over rubble and brick heaps. Presently he came to an open doorway, where sat a solitary half-caste smoking a pipe and reading an old Heraldo.

“Oh, hombre,” said Cartwright in Spanish, “have you seen my three friends come in here?”

“Yes, Señor,” nodded the man; “they have just entered.”

He indicated the direction, which lay through a dark and smelly passage.

Cartwright walked along this stuffy hallway, and, turning the corner, came upon an interesting group gathered about a closed door, against which one, and the least sober, of the party was hammering. Near by stood a small, stout man in soiled evening dress, grinning his approval, and it was clear that the visitors were at once known and welcome.

“Open the door, my dream of joy,” hiccupped the young man, hammering at the panel. “We have come to bring you homage and adoration—tell her to open the door, Jose,” he addressed the manager of Tangier’s theatre, and the small man minced forward and spoke in English.

“It is all right, my dear. Some friends of mine wish to see you.”

A voice inside, which Cartwright recognised, answered:

“I will not see them. Tell them to go away.”

“You hear?” said the manager, shrugging his shoulders. “She will not see you. Now go back to your seats and let me persuade her.”

“Señor!” He raised his eyebrows to the unexpected apparition of Cartwright. “What are you doing here?”

“I have come to see my friend,” said Cartwright, “Miss O’Grady.”

“It is forbidden to enter the theatre through the saloon of artistes,” said the small man pompously. “If Miss O’Grady is your friend, you must wait for her until the performance is over.”

Cartwright took no notice. He was a tall man of athletic build and shouldering his way past the others with no difficulty, he tapped on the panel.

“Miss O’Grady,” he said, “here is an English visitor wants to see you!”

“English?” said the voice. “Come in for the love of Mike!”

The door was opened, and a girl with a silk kimono pulled over her stage dress, offered him a smiling welcome. The young Spaniard who had been hammering on the panel of the door would have followed, but Cartwright’s arm barred him.

“Do you want this fellow?” he asked.

“Do I want him——” said Miss O’Grady bitterly, “do I want the scarlet fever or measles? You bet I don’t want him. He’s been pestering me ever since I’ve been here.”

“Do you hear what the lady says?” said Cartwright, speaking in Spanish. “She does not desire your acquaintance.”

“My father owns this theatre,” said the young man loudly.

“Then he’s got a rotten property,” replied the calm Cartwright.

The Spaniard turned in a rage to his soiled satellite.

“You will put this man out at once, Jose, or there will be trouble for you.”

The little man shrugged his helplessness.

“Sir,” he said in English, “you see my unhappy position. The señor is the son of my proprietor and it will be bad for me if you stay. I ask you as a friend and caballero to go at once and spare me misfortune.”

Cartwright looked at the girl.

“Must you go on again in this infernal place?” he asked.

She nodded, laughter and admiration in her eyes.

“What happens if you chuck this infernal job?”

“I’m fired,” said the girl. “I’ve a ten weeks’ contract with these people.”

“What do you get?”

“Two hundred and fifty pesetas a week,” she said contemptuously. “It’s a wonderful salary, isn’t it?”

He nodded.

“How many more weeks have you to go before your contract is finished?”

“Another four,” she said, “we’re playing in Cadiz next week, in Seville the week after, then Malaga, then Granada.”

“Do you like it?”

“Like it!” the scorn in her voice was her answer.

“The dresses belong to the troupe, I guess,” he said. “Get into your street clothes and I’ll wait for you.”

“What are you going to do?” she asked, eyeing him narrowly.

“I’ll make good your lost contract,” he said.

“Why?”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“I don’t like to see an English girl——”

“Irish,” she corrected.

“I mean Irish,” he laughed. “I don’t like to see an Irish girl doing this kind of thing with a lot of horrible half-breeds. You’ve talent enough for London or Paris. What about Paris? I know any number of people there.”

“Could you get me a good engagement?” she asked eagerly.

He nodded.

“What’s your name, anyway?” she demanded.

“Never mind about my name. Smith, Brown, Jones, Robinson—anything you like.”

It was the agitated little manager who interfered.

“Sir,” he said, “you must not persuade this lady to leave the theatre. I have her under heavy penalties. I can bring her before the judge——”

“Now just forget that!” said Cartwright, “there is no judge in Tangier. She is a British subject, and the most you can do is to take her before the British Consul.”

“When she returns to Spain——” said the little man growing apoplectic.

“She will not return to Spain. She will go to Gibraltar if she goes anywhere,” said Cartwright, “and from Gibraltar she will be on the sea until she reaches a British port.”

“I will go to the Spanish Consul,” screamed the little manager, clawing the air. “I will not be robbed. You shall not interfere with my business, you——”

Much of this, thought Cartwright, was intended for the glowering young Spaniard who stood in the background. He went outside, closed the door and stood with his back toward it. On a whispered instruction from his employer’s son, whose hands were now flickering fire as he gesticulated in his excitement, Jose the manager disappeared, and returned a few minutes later with two stalwart stage hands.

“Will you leave this theatre at once and quietly?” demanded the foaming manager.

“I will not leave the theatre until I am ready,” said Cartwright, “and if I leave otherwise, I shall certainly not leave quietly.”

The manager stood back with a melodramatic gesture.

“Eject the caballero,” he said finely.

The two men hesitated. Then one came forward.

“The señor must leave,” he said.

“In good time, my friend,” replied Cartwright.

A hand gripped his arm, but instantly he had shaken free, and had driven with all his strength at the man’s jaw. The stage hand dropped like a log. He pushed at the door behind him.

“Put your kimono over your things,” he said quickly. “You can send the stage kit back to-morrow. There is going to be a rough house.”

“All right,” said a voice behind him, and the girl slipped out, still in her kimono and carrying a bundle of clothes under her arm.

“You know the way out? I’ll follow you. Now, Jose,” he said flippantly, “I’m going—quietly.”

CHAPTER II

HE left behind him a pandemonium of sound and a scintillation of flickering diamonds. He found the girl waiting for him in the darkness.

“Br-r-r! It’s cold!” she shivered.

“Where are you staying?” he asked.

“At the little hotel opposite the British Consulate,” she said. “It isn’t much of a place, but it was the only room I could get—at the price.”

“You’d better not go there,” he said. “I’ll send for your boxes in the morning. Give me those clothes.”

He took them from her and put them under his arm, and she fell in by his side.

“I am glad to be out of it,” she said breathlessly, taking his arm; “it’s a dog’s life. I was going to quit to-morrow. Those boys have been following me round ever since I came to Tangier. I don’t think I’d better go back to my hotel, anyway,” she said after a moment; “they’re a pretty tough crowd, these Spaniards, and though I don’t understand their beastly language, I know just what kind of happy holiday they’re planning for me.”

They were in the town, passing up the street of the mosque, when she asked him:

“Where are you taking me?”

“To the Continental,” he said.

“Like this?” she said in dismay, and he laughed.

“I have an office in this street,” he said; “you can go in and dress. I’ll wait for you outside.”

He showed her into the tiny room which served as the headquarters of the Angera Gold Mining Syndicate, and sat on the irregular stone steps, waiting until she was dressed. Presently she came out, a presentable and an attractive figure.

“I have just thought,” he said, “that you had better to go the Central—I am staying at the Continental and it wouldn’t look nice.”

“I’ve been thinking something of the sort myself,” she said. “What about my broken engagement? Were you joking when you said you would pay? I hate talking about money, but I am broke—Jose owes me a week’s salary.”

“I’ll make good the money to-morrow,” he said. “I can give you a tenner now.”

“What is the idea?” she asked him again. “I’ve read a lot of books, and I know the knight errant business backwards. You don’t strike me as being a something-for-nothing man.”

“I’m not,” he said coolly. “It occurred to me when I saw you on the stage, that you might be useful. I want a person in Paris I can trust—somebody who could look after my interests.”

“I’m not a business woman,” she said quickly. “I hate business.”

“Business is done by men,” said he significantly. “And there are a few men I want you to keep track of. Do you understand that?”

She nodded.

“I see,” she said at last. “It is better than I thought.”

He did not trouble to ask her what she had thought, or what she imagined he had planned, but saw her into the hotel, arranged for a room, and walked slowly back to the Continental. He was in the vestibule of that hotel before he remembered that he had left an eminent King’s Counsel and Member of Parliament smoking his cigar in a loge of the Tangier circus.

“I missed you,” said Maxell the next morning. “When you remembered and came to pick me up, I was on my way back—we must have passed somewhere in the little Sok. What happened last night?”

“Nothing much,” said Cartwright airily. “I went round and saw the girl. She was very amusing.”

“How amusing?” asked the other curiously.

“Oh, just amusing.” Vaguely: “I found her annoyed by the attention which was being paid to her by a veritable Spanish hidalgo.”

“And you sailed in and rescued her, eh?” said Maxell. “And what happened to her after she was rescued?”

“I saw her home to her hotel, and there the matter ended. By the way, she leaves by the Gibel Musa for Gibraltar this morning.”

“Hm!” Maxell looked absently at the letter he had in his hand, folded it and put it away.

“Is the mail in?” asked Cartwright, interested, and Maxell nodded.

“I suppose you’ve had your daily letter from your kiddie?”

Maxell smiled.

“Yes,” he said, “it is not a baby letter, but it is very amusing.”

“How old is she?” asked Cartwright.

“She must be nine or ten,” said the other.

“I wonder if it is just coincidence, or whether it is fate,” mused Cartwright.

“What is a coincidence?” asked the other.

“The fact that you’ve got a kid to look after, and I’m in a sort of way responsible for a bright lad. Mine is less interesting than yours, I think. Anyway, he’s a boy and a sort of cousin. He has two fool parents who were born to slavery—the sort of people who are content to work for somebody all their lives and regard revolt against their condition as an act of impiety. I’ve only seen the kid once, and he struck me as the sort who might break loose from that kind of life and take a chance. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have interested myself in him.”

“How far does your interest extend?” asked Maxell curiously. “You’re not the sort of person, I should imagine, who would take up the unfortunate poor as a hobby.”

“Not a something-for-nothing man, in fact,” laughed Cartwright. “I’ve been told that twice in twenty-four hours.”

“Who was the other person—the actress?”

Cartwright roared with laughter and slapped the other on the knee.

“You’re a good guesser,” he said. “No, I am not a something-for-nothing person. I’m one of those optimists who plant fir cones so that I shall have some good firewood for my old age. I don’t know what sort of a man Timothy will make, but, as I say, he shapes good, and anyway, you and I are in the same boat.”

“Except this,” said Maxell, “that from what you say, you aren’t particularly interested in your protégé, and you don’t really care whether he shapes good or shapes bad.”

“That’s true,” admitted Cartwright. “He’s an experiment.”

“My little girl is something more than that,” said Maxell quietly; “she’s the only living thing I have any real affection for—she is my dead brother’s child.”

“Your niece, eh? Well, that gives you an interest which I have not. I never had a niece and I should just hate to be called uncle, anyway.”

Their conversation was interrupted at this point by the arrival of a small man dressed in his best clothes. On his brow was a frown which was intended to be terrible, but was slightly amusing. Jose Ferreira had dressed and prepared himself for an interview which, as he had described to his friends, could not fail to be at once “terrifying and vital.” For, as he had said: “This man has sliced my life!”

He began his speech to Cartwright as he had rehearsed it.

“Estoy indignado——”

But Cartwright cut him short with an expression of mock fear. “Horroroso! You are indignant, are you? Well, come, little man, and tell me why you are indignant.”

“Señor,” said the man solemnly, “you have put upon me a humiliation and a shame which all my life I shall regret.”

The conversation was in Spanish, but Maxell was an excellent Spanish scholar.

“What’s the trouble?” he asked, before Jose, still labouring under the sense of his wrongs, could get going again.

“Listen to him and discover,” mocked Cartwright. “I have taken from his incomparable company its joy and its gem.”

“In other words, the amiable Miss O’Grady,” said Maxell.

“Yes, yes, señor,” broke in Jose. “For me it is ruin! The money I have spent to make my company perfect! It is financed by one who is the greatest man in Tangier and it is his son who tells me that, unless I bring back this lady—for me there is the street and the gutter,” he wept.

Maxell looked slyly at his companion.

“There’s another chance for you to plant a fir cone,” he said. “Can’t you find some use for this gentleman?”

But Cartwright was not smiling.

“Señor Ferreira,” he said crisply, “you are, as all Spain knows, a thief and a rogue. If you associate with bigger thieves and bigger scoundrels, that is your business. I can only tell you that you may think yourself lucky I did not bring this case before the Spanish Consul. I assure you, you would never have put your foot in Tangier again after the stories I have heard about you.”

The little Spaniard was open-mouthed and impressed. He was also a little frightened. Cartwright’s accusation had been at a venture, but he argued that it was scarcely likely that, in an establishment of the description which Mr. Ferreira controlled, there could have been no incidents which reflected upon the manager.

“Everything which is said about me is a lie!” said the little man vigorously. “I have lived a life of the highest virtue! To-day I complain to the British Consul, and we shall see!”

“Complain,” said Cartwright.

“This chance I will give you.” Señor Ferreira wagged a fat, stumpy finger. “Restore to me Miss O’Grady, and the matter shall go no farther.”

“Miss O’Grady has left Tangier,” said the other calmly, “so it is clear to you that I cannot restore her.”

“She has not left,” vociferated the Spaniard. “We had a man to watch the boat leaving for the Gibel Musa and she did not leave the pier.”

“She left the beach,” explained Cartwright patiently; “she was rowed out by a boatman from the Cecil. At this moment she is half-way to Gibraltar.”

Mr. Ferreira groaned.

“It is ruin for me,” he said. “Perhaps for you also,” he added ominously. “I can do no less than depart for Paris to lay this matter before my excellent patron, Señor Don——”

Cartwright jerked his head to the door.

“Get out,” he said, and turned his attention to the newspaper which he had picked up from the table.

Maxell waited until the little man had gone, still seething with his “indignado,” then turned to Cartwright.

“This is rather a serious matter, Cartwright; what has happened to the girl?”

“Didn’t you hear? I have sent her to Gibraltar,” said Cartwright. “I wouldn’t leave a dog in that company. And from Gibraltar she goes home by the first P. & O.,” he said briefly.

“Hm!” said Maxell for the second time.

“What the devil are you ‘hming’ about?” snarled his companion. “The girl is gone. I shall not see her again. It was an act of charity. Do you disapprove?”

“I’m sorry,” said Maxell. “I didn’t know you felt so bad about it. No, I think you’ve done the girl a very good turn. But in these days one doesn’t expect——”

“Blessed is he that expecteth nothing, Maxell,” said Cartwright sententiously, “for he shall not be disappointed. I don’t suppose that the proprietor, whoever he is, cares a snap of his fingers about the matter—it is his infernal son who will fire the adorable Jose.”

That afternoon the two men had an interview on the outskirts of the town with a very plainly dressed Moor, who came to them so cautiously that the observers might have been pardoned if they thought he was a criminal. In the eyes of the divine rulers of Morocco he was something more than a criminal, because he was an emissary of El Mograb, the Pretender. There was a price upon the messenger’s head, and his caution was, therefore, commendable. He brought a letter from El Mograb to Cartwright, and it was a message of cheer.

Maxell and his friend had gone out early in the afternoon and had waited two hours under a scorching sun for the courier to arrive. For a man of law, the fact that he was coquetting with the Sultan’s enemy did not distress Maxell, who knew the history of the country too well to worry very much about Sultan or Pretender. The Sultan’s reign, marked with the turbulence of people and the self-indulgence of monarch, was already doomed. His uncle, El Mograb, a born leader of men and captain of seven thousand well-armed soldiers, was but waiting the psychological moment to strike; and Adbul, with his motor-cars and brass bedstead, his geegaws and his frippery, would disappear into the limbo which is especially reserved for extravagant and unstable rulers.

The news from El Mograb was good. It reconfirmed the concession which one of his shereefs had made on his behalf, and sent a message in flowery Arabic—a message of thanks to the man who had supplied him with the very necessary rifles.

“That was news to me,” said Cartwright as they rode back to the town. “I didn’t know you were gun-running, Maxell, or that you were so solid with El Mograb.”

“I like El Mograb,” said Maxell. “He’s one of the many Moors who have impressed me. You mustn’t forget that I have been visiting Morocco since I was a boy and most of the chiefs are known to me personally. I knew El Mograb’s brother, who was killed at Tetuan, and when he was a favourite in court circles he entertained me at Fez.”

“What is his word worth?” asked Cartwright carelessly.

“It is worth all the contracts that ever went to Somerset House for stamping,” said the other with emphasis. “I think you can go ahead with your scheme.”

Cartwright nodded.

“I’ll go back to London and raise the money,” he said. “We shall want a couple of millions eventually, but half a million will do to go on with. You had better be with me in the big scheme, Maxell. There is nothing to lose for you. You’ll be in on the ground floor. What is the good of your pottering about with your little Company—I mean the Parent Company?”

“I have faith in that,” said Maxell. “I know just the amount of my indebtedness.”

“You’re a fool,” said the other shortly. “The big scheme may mean millions to you, and I shall want your help and guidance.”

Maxell hesitated. The lure was dazzling, the prize was immense. But it meant risks which he was not prepared to take. He knew something of Cartwright’s financial methods; he had seen them in their working, and had done not a little on one occasion to save Cartwright from the consequences of his own cleverness. Yet, as he argued, Cartwright would have no difficulty in raising the money from the general public, and his presence on the board would certainly be a guarantee against his companion departing from the narrow path.

Although it was not generally known that he was associated in any of Cartwright’s enterprises, there had been a whisper of an inquiry in influential quarters, and it had been hinted to him that, on the whole, it would be better if he kept himself aloof from the gentleman who, admirable business man as he was, had a passion for enterprises which occasionally verged upon the illegal. But those influential quarters had not whispered anything in the shape of a definite promise that his welfare was entirely in their keeping and that his future would not be overlooked.

He was an ambitious man, but his ambitions ran in realisable directions. The services he had rendered to the Government were such as deserved a recognition, and the only question was what form that recognition would take? His knowledge of languages qualified him for an important appointment under the Foreign Office; but the Foreign Office was a close preserve and difficult to break into. There were too many permanent officials who regarded the service as a family affair, and were jealous of patronage outside their own charmed circle.

He went in to lunch that day to find Cartwright reading a telegram which he folded up and put into his pocket upon the other’s appearance.

“My little friend has arrived in Gibraltar,” said Cartwright.

Maxell looked at him curiously.

“What happens now?” he demanded.

“Oh, I’m sending her home.”

Cartwright’s voice was brisk and he spoke in the manner of a man referring to a topic too unimportant to be discussed.

“And after?” pursued Maxell, and the other shrugged his shoulders.

“I have given her a letter of introduction to a friend of mine,” he said carelessly. “I have one or two theatrical interests in town.”

Maxell said nothing, and could have dismissed the matter as lightly as his companion, for the girl’s future scarcely interested him.

She had been but a figure on the stage; her personality, her very appearance, left no definite impression. But if he was not interested in the girl, he was interested in Cartwright’s private mind. Here was a man of whom he could not know too much. And somehow he felt that he had hardly cracked the surface of Cartwright’s character though he had known him for years, and though they were working together to a common end.

The way of a man with a maid is wonderful, but it is also instructive to the cold-blooded onlooker, who discovers in that way a kind of creature he has never met before; a new man, so entirely different from the familiar being he had met in club or drawing-room as to be almost unrecognisable. And he wanted to know just this side of Cartwright, because it was the side on which he had scarcely any information.

“I suppose you won’t see her again?” he said, playing with his knife and looking abstractedly out of the window.

“I shouldn’t think so,” said Cartwright, and then, with a sudden irritation: “What the devil are you driving at, Maxell? I may see the girl—I go to music-halls, and it is hardly likely I should miss her. Naturally I am interested in the lady I have rescued from this kind of thing”—he waved his hand vaguely toward Tangier Bay—“and she may be useful. You don’t mean to say you’re struck on her?”

He tried to carry war into the enemy’s camp and failed, for Maxell’s blue eyes met his steadily.

“I hardly know what she looks like,” he said, “and I am not likely to fall in love with a lady who left absolutely no impression upon me.”

He left next day on the boat for Cadiz, en route to Paris and London, and he and Cartwright had as a fellow-passenger a shabby little man whose belongings were packed in an American-cloth suit-case inscribed in flourishing capitals, evidently by the owner, “Jose Ferreira.”

Mr. Ferreira spent most of his time on the ship’s deck, biting his nails and enlarging his grievance against the unconscious Cartwright.

CHAPTER III

MAXELL did not stay many hours in Paris. The Sud Express landed him in the French capital at seven in the morning. He left Paris by the midday train for London. The Long Vacation was drawing to an end, and there were briefs of certain importance requiring examination. There was also a consultation with the Attorney-General on an interpretation of a clause in the new Shipping Act, and he was also due to address his constituents before the reassembling of Parliament.

He might ruminate in vain to find one attractive feature of his programme. Parliament wearied him, and the ordinary practices of the law no longer gave him pleasure.

There was an interest in the work he was doing for the Government, and if he had the faintest hint of pleasure in his immediate prospects, the cause was to be found in the vexed problems centring about this new, and loosely drawn, shipping law. It was a measure which had been passed in a hurry, and when the acid test of litigation had been applied, some of its weak points had been discovered.

The weakest of these points was one affecting the load-line. In an action heard before a High Court Judge, the doubtful clause had been interpreted so as to render the Act a dead letter; and there were particular and especial Governmental reasons why the appeal which the Government had made from the verdict of the lower Court should upset that decision.

There is no need to give the particulars of the great dispute, which arose over the three words “or otherwise loaded,” and it is only necessary to say that, before he had reached London, Mr. Maxell had discovered a way for the Government out of their difficulty.

It was this opinion which he delivered to a relieved Attorney-General, and, with the new argument, the Government were able to present so strong a case to the Court of Appeal, that a month after his return the verdict of the lower Court was reversed.

“And,” said the Attorney-General, “the devils can take it to the House of Lords now and still lose—thanks to your brain wave, Maxell!”

They were smoking in the Crown Room at the Law Courts after the decision had been delivered.

“Where have you been for your holiday, by the way?” asked the Attorney suddenly.

“Morocco,” replied the other.

“Morocco?” The Attorney nodded thoughtfully. “Did you hear anything of friend Cartwright?” he asked.

“We were staying at the same hotel,” replied Maxell.

“A weird person,” said the thoughtful Attorney. “A very curious man—what a Chancellor that fellow would make!”

“He never struck me that way,” smiled Maxell.

“Do you know him well—I mean, are you a particular friend of his?” demanded the Attorney.

“No,” said Maxell indifferently. “I know him—so many men in the law know him.”

“You’re not by any chance associating with him in business now, are you?”

“No,” said Maxell promptly.

It was a lie and he knew it was a lie. It was told deliberately from the desire to stand well in the eyes of his friends. He knew Cartwright’s reputation well enough, and just how he was regarded by the party whom he had served for three years. Cartwright had been Member for a London borough, but had resigned. “Pressure of business” was the excuse he gave, but there were people who said that it was owing to the pressure of the Party Whips, who smelt a somewhat unsavoury case coming into Court with Cartwright figuring prominently.

There is no way of proving or disproving the statement, because the case in which Cartwright most decidedly was interested was withdrawn from the list at the last moment. The uncharitable say that it cost Cartwright a small fortune to bring about this withdrawal, and certainly one of the ladies interested (she was a small-part actress at the Hippoceus) gave up her stage work and had been living in affluence ever since. Cartwright pooh-poohed the suggestion that the case held anything sensational—but he did not enter political life again.

“I am glad you’re not associated with him,” said the Attorney simply. “He’s an awfully nice fellow and I suppose he is as straight and as sound as the best man in the City. But he’s a shifty fellow—just a little bit”—he hesitated—“a little wrong. You understand, Maxell—or shall we say slightly shop-soiled?”

“He is certainly a brilliant man,” said Maxell, not desirous of defending his friend too vigorously.

“Yes, I suppose he is,” admitted the Attorney. “All men like that are brilliant. What a pity his genius does not run in a smooth channel, but must follow the course of a burning cracker, here, there and everywhere, exploding at every turn!”

He slipped down from the table, on the edge of which he had been sitting and pulled off his robe.

“I’m glad to know you’re not associated with Cartwright, anyway,” he said.

Maxell did not attempt to probe beneath the surface of his twice-repeated remark.

He went back to Cavendish Square to his flat and to a tiny, solemn-eyed little girl who had been brought up from Hindhead that day on her monthly visit to “Uncle Max.”

Cartwright had not accompanied his friend to England, and with good reasons. A great deal of his work was carried out in Paris, where he had an important financial backing. He occupied a flat overlooking the imposing, but none too convenient, Avenue of the Grand Army. His home was at the unfashionable end of this interminable thoroughfare, which meant that his rooms were larger and his rent cheaper, and that he was freer from observation than he would have been had he lived according to his means or station in a luxurious flat nearer the Etoil.

He had a board meeting to attend, an informal board meeting, it is true, but none the less important.

Cartwright was the chairman and managing director of the London and Paris Gold Syndicate, a flourishing concern which held big blocks of shares in various land and gold-mining companies, and controlled three mines of its own on the West Rand. Though a Company drawing a modest revenue from its Johannesburg property, its operations were not confined to gold development pure and simple. It was, in fact, an outside broker’s on a grand scale. It gambled heavily and gambled wisely. The shareholders seldom received less than a twelve and a half per cent. dividend, and there were years when in addition it paid a bonus equal to its own share capital.

It numbered its clients at one hundred and fifty thousand, the majority being small people who preferred speculation to investment—country parsons, doctors and the small gamblers who lived fearfully on the fringe of high finance. The shares were at a premium and Cartwright’s interest brought him a considerable sum annually. What probably attracted the little speculator was the knowledge of the Company’s reserve, which stood in the balance-sheet at a respectable figure. It was the question of these reserves that occupied the attention of the four quiet men who met informally in the room of a Paris hotel.

There were three to one against Cartwright, because none of his companions could see eye to eye with him.

“It is too dangerous, M. Cartwright,” said Gribber, whose nationality was suspect; “our risks are already high and we cannot afford, in my judgment, to extend them. The money would be subscribed over and over again if you went to the English public.”

Cartwright frowned.

“Why shouldn’t we make the profit?” he asked; “we could borrow from our reserve.”

“That we can’t touch!” interrupted the cautious Gribber, shaking his head violently. “My faith, no, we cannot touch that! For it is certain that the lean years will come when our clients will require their dividends.”

Cartwright did not pursue the subject. There were other ways of financing his Moorish scheme.

The Benson Syndicate, for example.

He spoke eloquently of this new venture, which was to have its headquarters in Paris, and would be under the eye of his sceptical co-directors. He mentioned names glibly and easily—names that carried weight in the financial world. The three men agreed that the Benson Syndicate had the appearance of a safe investment.

More important was the business which brought Alfred Cartwright to the St. Lazaire Station to meet a passenger a week later.

She sprang from the train and looked round with doubting face, which lighted the moment she saw the saturnine Cartwright.

“My! I am relieved,” she said. “I was scared to think you wouldn’t be here to meet me, and I’d only got a few pounds left.”

“You got my wire?” he asked, and she smiled, showing two rows of pearly teeth.

“I’m still mystified,” she said. “What is it you want me to do in Paris?”

“Let us eat first and talk afterwards,” he said. “You must be hungry.”

“I’m starving!” she laughed.

He had a car waiting for her, and whisked her off to a little street leading from the Boulevard des Italiens, where one of the best restaurants in Paris is situated. The girl looked about her with an approving air. The gaiety and luxury of the place appealed to her.

“My word!” she said enviously; “do you come to lunch here every day?”

“Do you know this place?” he asked.

“I’ve seen it,” she admitted, “but a three-franc dinner at Duval’s has been my limit so far.”

She told him how she had come to the Continent as a dancer, and had “starred” in a tiny little cabaret in Montmartre as one of the “dashing Sisters Jones,” before she had been seen by the impresario who was recruiting material for his tour through the Levant.

Cartwright judged her to be nineteen, knew her to be extremely pretty, and guessed that, under certain conditions, she would be presentable even to the best of the circles in which he moved. He wondered, with a grim smile, what Maxell, that austere and fastidious man, would say if he knew that the girl was with him in Paris. Would Maxell accept her? He thought not. Maxell was a thought straitlaced and in some ways was a bore. But Maxell was necessary. He was a brilliant lawyer, and moreover stood well with the Government, and there might come a time when Maxell would be immensely useful. He could well afford to give the lawyer a slice of the pickings he intended making, because Maxell’s wants were few and his ambitions on the modest side.

Cartwright thought in millions. Maxell was a five-figure man. If all went well with Cartwright’s scheme, undoubtedly he could well afford the five figures.

“What happened to your friend?” asked the girl, as though divining his thoughts: “The man you told me I was to keep away from. Why didn’t you want him to see me?”

Cartwright shrugged his shoulders.

“Does it really matter?” he asked; “he’s in England, anyway.”

“Who is he?” She was curious.

“Oh, a friend of mine.”

“And who are you?” she asked, facing him squarely. “If I’m going to see anything of you in Paris, that Smith, Brown or Robinson business isn’t quite good enough. You’ve been decent to me, but I want to know who I’m working for, and what is the kind of work you want me to do.”

Cartwright pinched his neck—a nervous little trick of his when he was thinking.

“I have business interests here,” he said.

“You don’t want me for an office?” she asked suspiciously. “My education is perfectly rotten.”

He shook his head.

“No, I don’t want you for an office,” he replied with a smile. “And yet in a sense I want you to do office work. I have a little syndicate here, which is known as the Benson Syndicate. Benson is my name——”

“Or the name you go by,” she said quickly, and he laughed.

“How sharp you are! Well, I don’t suppose O’Grady is your name, if it comes to that.”

She made no reply and he went on:

“I want somebody in Paris I can rely upon; somebody who will receive money, transmit it to the Benson Syndicate, and re-invest that money in such concerns as I shall indicate.”

“Don’t use long words,” she said. “How do you know I’m not going to rob you? Nobody’s ever trusted me with money before.”

He might have told her that she would not be trusted with a great deal at a time and that she would be carefully watched. He preferred, however, an explanation more flattering to his new assistant. And not only was it flattering, but it contained a big grain of truth, expressing, to an extent, Alfred Cartwright’s creed.

“Women are more honest than men,” he said. “I should think twice before I put a man—even my best friend—in the position I’m putting you. It will be a simple matter, and I shall pay you well. You can live at one of the best hotels—in fact, it is absolutely necessary that you should. You may”—he hesitated—“you may be Madam Benson, a rich Englishwoman.”

She looked at him from under perplexed brows.

“What is the good of asking me to do that?” she said in a tone of disappointment. “I thought you were going to give me a job I could do. I’m a fool at business.”

“You can remain a fool,” he said coolly. “There’s nothing to do except carry out a certain routine, which I shall explain to you so that you can’t possibly make a mistake. Here is a job which gives you plenty of time, pays you well, gives you good clothes and an auto. Now, are you going to be a sensible girl and take it?”

She thought a moment, then nodded.

“If it means lunching here every day, I’ll take it,” she said decidedly.

Thus was formed the remarkable Benson Syndicate, about which so much has been written, and so many theories evolved. For, if the truth be told, the Benson Syndicate had no existence until Cartwright called it into being in Ciro’s Restaurant. It was born of the opposition he had received, and its creation was hastened by certain disquieting telegrams which arrived almost every hour from London.

Cartwright was, as has been said, a man of many interests. The door-plate of his office in Victoria Street, London, was covered with the names of the companies which had their headquarters in the ornate suite which he occupied. There were two other suites of offices in the City of London for which Mr. Cartwright paid the rent, although he did not pay it in his own name. There were syndicates and companies innumerable, Development Syndicates, Exploitation Companies, Financial and Mining Companies, all duly registered and all keeping one solicitor busy; for the Companies Acts are tricky, and Cartwright was too clever a man to contravene minor regulations.

And to all these companies there were shareholders; some of them contented, some—the majority—wholly dissatisfied with their lot, and quite a large number who were wont to show their share certificates to their friends as curiosities, and tell them the sad story of how they were inveigled into investment.

Only a clever company lawyer can describe in detail the tortuous character of Cartwright’s system of finance. It involved loans from one company to another, very often on the security of shares in a third company; it involved a system of over-drafts, drawn in favour of some weakly member of his family, secured by the assets of one which could show a bold face to the world, and was even quoted in the Stock Exchange list; and divers other complicated transactions, which only the expert mathematician could follow.

Cartwright was a rich man, accounted a millionaire by his friends; but he was that type of millionaire who was never at a loss for a thousand, but who was generally hard up for ten thousand. He came to London much against his will, in response to an urgent telegram, and, having cleared the difficulties which his subordinates had found insuperable, he had a few hours to attend to his private affairs before he took the train back to Paris.

His secretary produced a heap of small bills requiring settlement, and going through these, he paused before one printed slip, and frowned.

“That boy’s school fees weren’t paid last term,” he said.

“No, sir,” said the secretary. “If you remember, I mentioned the matter to you when you were in London last. I was taking upon myself the responsibility of paying the fees, if you hadn’t returned. The boy is coming up to-day, by the way, sir, to be measured for some clothes.”

“Coming here?” asked Mr. Cartwright, interested.

“Yes, sir.”

Cartwright picked up the bill.

“T. A. C. Anderson,” he read. “What does T. A. C. stand for—‘Take A Chance’?”

“I understood he was named after you—Timothy Alfred Cartwright,” said the secretary.

“Yes; of course,” Cartwright grinned. “Still, Take A Chance isn’t a bad name for a kid. When is he arriving?”

“He ought to be here now,” said the man, looking at his watch. “I’ll go out and see.”

He disappeared into the outer office, and presently returned.

“The boy is here, sir,” he said. “Would you like to see him?”

“Bring him in,” said Cartwright. “I’d like to meet this nephew, or cousin, or whatever he is.”

He wondered vaguely what had induced him to take upon himself the responsibility of the small child, and with remorseless judgment analysed the reason as being personal vanity.

The door opened and a child strode in. “Strode” is the only word to describe the quick, decisive movement of the bright-eyed lad who looked with unflinching eye at Cartwright. Cartwright did not look at his clothes, but at the grey, clear eyes, the firm mouth, extraordinarily firm for a boy of fourteen, and the capable and not over-clean hands.

“Sit down, son,” said Cartwright. “So you’re my nephew.”

“Cousin, I think,” said the boy, critically examining the contents of Cartwright’s table. “You’re Cousin Alfred, aren’t you?”

“Oh, I’m a cousin, am I? Yes, I suppose I am,” said Cartwright, amused.

“I say,” said the boy, “is that the school bill? The Head has been rather baity about that.”

“ ‘Baity’?” said the puzzled Cartwright. “That’s a new one on me.”

“Shirty,” said the boy calmly. “Annoyed, I suppose, is the correct word.”

Cartwright chuckled.

“What do you want to be?” he asked.

“A financier,” said T. A. C. Anderson promptly.

He seated himself, leant his elbow on the desk and his head on his hand, his eyes never leaving Cartwright.

“I think that’s a great scheme—finance,” he said. “I’m a whale at mathematics.”

“What particular branch of finance?” asked Cartwright with a smile.

“Other people’s finance,” said the boy promptly; “the same business as yours.”

Cartwright threw back his head and laughed.

“And do you think you’d be able to keep twenty companies in the air at the same time?” he said.

“In the air?” the boy frowned. “Oh, you mean going all at once? Rather! Anyway, I’d take a chance.”

The phrase struck Cartwright.

“Take a chance? That’s curious. I called you Take A Chance Anderson just before you came in.”

“Oh, they all call me that,” said the boy indifferently. “You see, they’re bound to stick a label on to a fellow with an initial like mine. Some of them call me ‘Tin and Copper Anderson,’ but most of them—the other name.”

“You’re a rum kid,” said his cousin. “You can come to lunch with me.”

CHAPTER IV

MR. ALFRED CARTWRIGHT had the enviable faculty of placing outside of his mind all subjects and persons which were unpleasant to think upon. Possessing this power, he could as lightly dismiss the memory of responsibilities, pleasant or unpleasant. He had scarcely left London before he had waived Master T. A. C. Anderson into oblivion. To do him justice, he had certainly speculated vaguely upon assuring his cousin’s future; but his mind was so completely occupied with his own that there was really not room for both—and Take A Chance Anderson had to go.

He reached Paris by the evening train, and drove straight to the apartment he had taken for his new protégé. He found her installed in a very comfortable flat on the unfashionable side of the Seine, and was welcomed with relief.

Miss Sadie O’Grady had not entirely overcome her suspicions of the bona fides of her newfound acquaintance. Yet, since he had not made love to her, but, on the contrary, had made it very clear that the part he expected her to play in his schemes involved no loss of self-respect, she was becoming reconciled to a relationship which, to say the least, was a strange one. She had established herself in a third-floor office on one of the boulevards, an uncomfortable and unaccustomed figure in an environment which was wholly foreign to her experience, though there was no need for her embarrassment, since she constituted the whole of the staff, and the callers were confined to the postman and the concierge who acted as office-cleaner.

She was to learn, however, that a daily attendance at her “bureau” did not constitute the whole of her duties, or fulfil all Cartwright’s requirements.

It was not until after dinner that night that Cartwright revealed himself.

“Sadie, my young friend,” he said, between puffs of his cigar, “I am going to tell you just what I want you to do.”

“I thought I knew,” she said, on her guard, and he laughed softly.

“You’ll never quite know what I want you to do,” he said frankly, “until I tell you. Now, I’m putting it to you very straight. I want nothing from you except service. And the service I require is of a kind which you need not hesitate to give me. You’re an actress, and I can speak to you more plainly than I could to some unsophisticated girl.”

She wondered what was coming, but had not long to wait.

“I will tell you something,” he said, “which is really more important than my name, about which you showed so much curiosity. There is a man in this city whom I want to get at.”

“How do you mean?” she asked suspiciously.

“He is a man who has it in his power to ruin me—a drunken sot of a fellow, without brain or imagination.”

He went on to explain briefly that he himself was a company promoter, and that he had an interest in a mine, as yet unproved, in Morocco.

“That is why you were there?” she nodded.

“That is exactly why,” replied Cartwright. “Unfortunately, right in the midst of the ground which I have either bought or secured mineral rights over, is a block of land which is the property of this man. He is a Spaniard—do you speak Spanish?”

“A little,” she admitted, “but it is precious little!”

“It doesn’t matter,” Cartwright shook his head. “He speaks English very well. Now, this land is absolutely valueless to the man, but every attempt I have made to buy it has been unsuccessful, and it is vitally necessary at this moment, when I am floating a company to develop the property, that his claims should be included in my properties.”

“What is his name?” asked the girl.

“Brigot,” replied Cartwright.

“Brigot?” repeated Sadie O’Grady thoughtfully. “I seem to have heard that name before.”

“It is pretty common in France, but not so common in Spain,” said Mr. Cartwright.

“And what am I to do?” asked the girl again.

“I will get you an introduction to him,” said Cartwright; “he’s a man with a fine eye for beauty, and in the hands of a clever girl could be wound round her little finger.”

The girl nodded.

“I see what you mean,” she said, “but nothing doing!”

“Wait!” said Cartwright. “I have told you that it is necessary for me to acquire this property. I am taking you into my confidence, and I know that you will respect that confidence. I am willing to pay any reasonable sum, and I neither want you to steal it nor make any personal sacrifice to serve my ends. I am willing to pay, and pay heavily.”

“What do you call heavily?” asked the girl coolly.

“For the property twenty thousand—for you ten thousand pounds,” suggested Cartwright, and the girl nodded.

“That’s got me,” she said. “Tell me what your plan is.”

“My plan is this,” said Cartwright. “You will appear to Señor Brigot—I will arrange that—as a wealthy young American lady who has been spending the winter in Morocco. His property follows a little wooded hill, one of the prettiest formations of its kind in the Angera country. You must rave about that hill, never cease speaking of its beauty and its attractiveness; and you must tell him that you would give anything in the world if you could build a house amidst that beautiful scenery—do you understand me?”

The girl nodded again.

“Brigot is a man somewhat susceptible to feminine charms,” Cartwright went on, “and, unless I am greatly mistaken, he will in one of his obliging moods, offer you the land at a nominal figure, particularly as he has been bitterly disappointed in his attempt to find gold.”

“I don’t like it,” said the girl after consideration. “You promised me that if I came to Paris you would get me a job in one of the theatres. That is what I am after, and the only thing I am fit for. The other business doesn’t seem decent——”

“Ten thousand pounds!” murmured Cartwright.

“It is a lot,” agreed the girl, “but how am I coming out of this business? I come out hopelessly compromised.”

Cartwright shrugged his shoulders with a deprecating smile.

“My dear girl——” he began.

“Wait a moment,” she said quietly; “let’s have a clear understanding. You don’t expect me to walk up to Señor Brigot the first time I meet him, or even the second, and say: ‘You’ve a very nice property. What will you sell it for?’ That is not the kind of transaction you expect me to conduct, is it?”

“Not exactly,” admitted Cartwright.

“It means just a little more than you say,” said the girl; “it means dinners and suppers and hand-holdings and stringing him along. And after it is all over, where am I? I’ve got as much respect for my character as you have for yours, Mr. Mysterious. I want to come out well in this business as you do, and I don’t want to leave my name behind, or be known in Paris—which is the world—as a decoy duck. I’d do an awful lot to please you, because I like you and because you’ve been decent to me. But ‘an awful lot’ does not mean making me so cheap that I am left in the slightly-soiled basket. Do you understand what I mean?”

“Perfectly,” said Cartwright, amazed at the girl’s cool reasoning. He had not given her credit for any of these fine sentiments she now enunciated, and he was piqued, and at the same time a little pleased.

“When you said you’d give me ten thousand pounds,” said the girl, “that sounded good. But it is not good enough. I’ve an idea in the back of my mind that the matter is a much bigger one for you than you’ve told me.”

“How big do you imagine?” bantered Cartwright.

“I think it is big enough to ruin you,” said the girl calmly, “and that you’d be willing to pay any price to get this property. Otherwise, you’d go to the man or send your lawyer in the ordinary way. Now, I don’t want your ten thousand pounds, but I’m going to make a proposition to you. I’ve said I like you and that’s no more than the truth. You told me you were a bachelor and I’ve told you that I’m man-free and heart-free. I don’t say I love you, and I don’t flatter myself that you love me. But if you want this thing to go through, and if you want me to go down in the mud to get it, you’ve got to pay the price——”

“And the price is——?” asked Cartwright curiously.

“You’ve got to marry me,” said the girl.

“Well, I’m——” Cartwright could only gasp his admiration; and then he began to laugh, at first quietly, and then, as the humour of the situation gained upon him, so loudly that the other patrons of the Café Scribe turned to look at him.

“It is a rum idea,” he said, “but——”

“But?” she repeated, keeping her eyes on his.

He nodded to her.

“It’s a bargain!” he said.

She looked at him as she put out her hand and took his, and slowly shook her head.

“My!” she said. “You want that fellow’s land pretty badly, I know!” and Cartwright began to laugh again.

Señor Brigot lived in some style for a man who was on the verge of ruin. He had a small house at Maisons Lafitte and a flat on the Boulevard Webber. He was a heavy, tired-looking man, with a dark moustache, obviously dyed, and a short beard, bearing evidence of the same attention. M. Brigot, like Mr. Cartwright, had many interests; but his chief interests were his own tastes and predilections. It was Señor Brigot’s boast that, although he had lived for twenty years in Paris, he had never seen Paris between the hours of six in the morning and one in the afternoon. His breakfast hour was two o’clock. By six o’clock in the evening he was becoming interested in life; and at the hour when most people retire to rest, he was in the prime of his day.

It happened on a certain evening that M. Brigot, who usually met dinner in an amicable frame of mind, sat down at his favourite table at the Abbaye with a big frown, and answered the polite maître d’hôtel’s cheery “Good evening” with a snarl.

Amongst his many enterprises and few possessions, and this Mr. Cartwright did not know, was the proprietorship and management of a small, ramshackle wooden theatre in the town of Tangier. He was likewise interested in several cabarets throughout Spain. But what pained him most at the moment was not distressing reports from any of these, but a six-page letter received that afternoon from his son, in which the hope of the house of Brigot had explained his reasons for discharging immediately a very necessary servant. Therefore Señor Brigot swore under his breath and cursed his first-born.

Coincident with the arrival of the letter had come one Jose Ferreira, who had been detained for a week at Madrid. Señor Brigot’s mind was occupied with Jose Ferreira when that worthy, smirking apologetically, as though conscious of the shabbiness of his dress-clothes, sidled into a seat on the opposite side of the table. Señor Brigot glared at him a moment, and Jose Ferreira shifted uneasily in his chair.

“If you had telegraphed to me, I would have settled the matter,” said Brigot, as though carrying on a conversation which he had broken off a few minutes before. “Instead, like the fool you are, you come all the way to Paris, wasting your time in Madrid, and the first I hear of the matter is from my son.”

“It was deplorable,” murmured Jose, “but Don Brigot——”

“Don Brigot!” sneered the father of that worthy. “Don Brigot is a monkey! Why did you take notice of him? Have you nothing else to do in Tangier but to look after that flea-ridden theatre? Have you no other duties?”

“The young señor was emphatic,” murmured the apologetic Jose. “He demanded that I should leave and what could I do?”

Brigot grunted something uncomplimentary. Whether it was intended for his son or for Ferreira, it was difficult to say. Ferreira was content to take it to himself.

Half-way through the dinner Brigot became more human.

“There will always be quarrels about women, my good Jose, and it is your business to be diplomatic,” he said. “My son is a fool; but then, all young men are fools. Why should you neglect my interests because Emanuel is a bigger fool than ever? Only this week I intended travelling to Tangier with the representative of a very rich syndicate who wishes to buy my land.”

“The same señor as before?” asked the interested Jose, who was not only the manager of Tangier’s theatre, but was also the representative of the rusty little gold-mining company which Brigot had floated.

The other nodded.

“The same cursed Englishman,” he said.

Quite unconscious of the fact that his master was cursing the very man whom Jose had most recently cursed, the little man smiled sympathetically.

“I also have a hatred of the English,” he said. “With what insolence do they treat one!”

For some time M. Brigot sat in silence, but presently he wiped his mouth on his napkin, tossed down a tumbler of red wine, and crooked his finger at his companion, inviting closer attention.

“In a day, or perhaps two, I shall send you back to Tangier,” he said.

“The theatre?” began Jose.

“The theatre—bah!” exclaimed the other scornfully. “A donkey-driver could look after the theatre! It is the mine!”

“The mine?” repeated the other in some astonishment.

So long had it been since a spade had been put to the ground, so long had those hopes of Brigot’s been apparently dead, that the very word “mine” had ceased to be employed when referring to the property.

“My Englishman will buy it,” said Brigot confidently. “I happen to know that he has taken up property in the neighbourhood, and he has already made me an offer. But such an offer! He shall pay my price, Jose,” he said, nodding as he picked his teeth, “and it will be a big price, because it is desirable that I should have money.”

Jose did not ask the price, but his employer saved him the trouble.

“Five million pesetas,” he said confidently; “for such a price the property will be sold, always providing, my friend, that we do not discover gold before the sale.”

Jose smiled weakly, a circumstance which seemed to annoy his companion.

“You are a fool,” said Brigot irritably; “you have no brains! You think that is a preposterous sum? Wait!”

When his subordinate’s dinner was finished, Jose was dismissed peremptorily. Brigot had a round of calls to make, a succession of people to be visited; and whilst he might interview the little man at dinner without losing caste, he had no desire to take him round to his usual haunts.

It was at the Abbaye at that golden hour when the price of wine soars and all that is smartest in Paris is assembled in the big saloon, that M. Brigot, who had reached a stage of geniality, met an entrancing vision. Brigot saw the girl and her cavalier at one of the tables, and recognised in the latter a well-known man about town. The latter caught his eye and walked across to him.

“Who is your charming companion?” whispered Brigot, whose failing was, as Cartwright accurately surmised, a weakness for pretty faces.

“She is an American lady who has just come from Morocco,” said the other glibly.

Cartwright had chosen Sadie O’Grady’s companion very well. In a few minutes Brigot had crossed to the other table and taken a seat, was introduced, and was in that pleasant glow of mind which comes to the man of his class who is conscious of having made an impression.

This “American widow,” with her queer, broken French, her beautiful eyes, and the charming distinction which goes best with good clothes, was more lovely than any woman he had ever met—so he swore to himself, as he had sworn before. The friendship progressed from day to day, and so great was the impression which the girl had made, that Brigot was seen abroad at most unusual hours.

The patient Jose Ferreira was despatched on a mission to Madrid, partly because Brigot was tired of seeing him hanging about, and partly because there was some genuine business to be done in the capital.

Sadie reported progress to her employer.

“Oh, yes, he’s crazy enough about me,” she said complacently, “and I’m going a little crazy myself. How long is this to go on?”

“Another week?” suggested Cartwright, smiling approvingly at the gloom on the pretty face. “Have you mentioned the fact that you’ve taken a fancy to his land?”

She nodded.

“He wanted to give it to me there and then,” she said, “but you know what these Spaniards are. If I had accepted, there would have been nothing for me but the front door.”

“Quite right,” agreed Cartwright. “He is the kind of fish you must play. Did he say anything about other offers he had received for the property?”

The girl nodded.

“He spoke about you,” she said; “he called you Benson—is that your real name?”

“It is good enough,” said Cartwright.

“It is queer,” mused the girl, looking at him thoughtfully, “that I never meet any of your friends in Paris, and that nobody knows you—by name. I went down to your flat on the Avenue of the Grand Army,” she confessed frankly, “and asked the concierge. You’re Benson there too.”

Cartwright chuckled.

“In my business,” he said, “it is necessary that one should be discreet. The name which goes in London is not good enough for Paris. And vice versa,” he added.

“You’re a strange man. I suppose if you marry me in the name of Benson it will be legal?” she asked dubiously.

“Of course it will be legal. I’m surprised at a girl of your intelligence asking such a question,” said Cartwright. “What is the programme for to-night?”

She pulled a little face.

“The Marigny and supper at Corbets—supper in a private dining-room.”

He nodded.

“So it’s come to that, has it? Well, you ought to make good to-night, Sadie. Remember, I am willing to pay up to fifty thousand pounds. It is going to be a tough job raising that money, and it will break my heart to pay it. But it will not only break my heart, but it will break me everlastingly and confoundedly to pay the man’s own price—and his property must be bought.”

“I’ll do my best,” said the girl, “but you have no doubt in your mind that it is going to be hard.”

He nodded.

At one o’clock the next morning he sat reading in his room, when a knock came to his door and the girl came in. She was half hysterical, but the light of triumph was in her eyes.

“Got it,” she said.

“Got it!” he repeated in wonder. “You don’t mean he sold?”

She nodded.

“For ten thousand pounds—three hundred thousand francs. What do you think of your little Sadie?”

“Are you serious?” he asked.

She nodded, smiling.

“What did he——?” he began.

She hesitated and closed her eyes.

“Don’t talk about it,” she said quickly. “I have to see him to-morrow at his lawyers, and the property will be transferred to me.”

“And after?”

She smiled grimly.

“The after-part will not be as pleasant as M. Brigot imagines,” she said. “I tell you, that fellow’s crazy—stark, staring mad. But I felt an awful beast, and I think he’ll kill me when he discovers I’ve sold him.”

“Don’t let that worry you,” said Cartwright easily.

CHAPTER V

HE saw the girl down to her waiting auto, and went back to his rooms to think. It was curious that at that hour, when the big trouble on his mind seemed likely to roll away, that his thoughts flew instantly to Maxell. What would the prim Maxell say, if he knew? He was satisfied that Maxell would not only disapprove, but would instantly and without notice sever all connection with the adventurous company promoter. Maxell would be outraged, appalled. Cartwright smiled at the thought.

He was under no illusion as to his own conduct. He knew he was acting despicably; but this view he dismissed from his mind as being too unpleasant for contemplation. Maxell was a prig—a necessary prig, but none the less priggish. He was necessary, at any rate, to Cartwright. Anyway, Maxell stood to win if the scheme went through.

Cartwright had reached nearly the end of his financial tether, and his whole future was bound up in the success or failure of the new promotion. He had exhausted every bit of his credit in order to take up the Angera property which he knew was rich in gold, and offered possibilities which no project of his had offered before.

He had milked his other companies dry, he had played with reserves; all except his Anglo-Parisian Finance Company, where the directors were too strong to allow him his own way; and, although Maxell was not aware of the fact, his “partner” had spent fabulous sums, not only in acquiring the land itself but in purchasing other gold-mining property in the region. It was a gamble, and a dangerous gamble. He was risking the substance of his fortune for the shadow of unlimited wealth.

Yet, was it a risk? he asked himself; with the properties that he could include in his new North Morocco Gold Mining Association—that was to be the title of the new company—there could be no doubt as to the result of the public issue. The British public dearly love a gamble, and a gold-mining gamble, with all its mysteries and uncertainties, more dearly than any.

He went to bed late, but was taking his chocolate and roll before a little café on the boulevard before nine. At half-past nine he was joined by the girl.

Cartwright had been undecided as to whether he should take his petit déjeuner outside or inside the café, and had decided, since the morning was bright and warm, to breakfast under the striped awning in full view of the street. Such great events hang upon slight issues.

Scarcely had the girl seated herself opposite to him, when a pedestrian, passing on the other side of the boulevard, halted and stared. Mr. Ferreira had sharp eyes and a wit not altogether dulled by his monotonous occupation.

Cartwright produced a bulky package from his pocket and laid it on the table before the girl.

“Put that in your bag and be careful with it,” he said; “there are three hundred thousand francs in notes. When the property is transferred to you, you must bring the transfer along to me.”

“What about your promise?” she asked suspiciously.

“That I will keep,” he said. “Don’t forget that you have the best guarantee in the possession of the transfer. Legally, it is your property until it is made over to me.”

She sat looking at the package absently, and presently she said:

“You’ve got to get me out of Paris at once. Otherwise I am due to leave by the Sud Express—with Brigot.”

He nodded.

“There is a train for Havre at two-fifteen,” he said.

He saw her into her car—another indiscretion since it brought him out of the shadow which the awning afforded, and gave the observer on the other side of the road an unmistakable view.

Brigot was waiting for her—a heavy-eyed, weary-looking man, whose hand shook whenever it rose to stroke his short, pointed beard.

His lawyer watched him curiously as he stepped forward to meet the girl with hands outstretched. It was not the first time that he had seen his client overwhelmed by a pretty face.

“Everything is ready, Nanette,” said the eager M. Brigot. (“Nanette” was the newfound name which Sadie O’Grady employed for this adventure.) “See here, I have all the documents ready!”

“And I have the money,” smiled the girl as she put the package down on the table.

“The money!” Señor Brigot waved such sordid matters out of existence with a magnificent flourish. “What is money?”

“Count it,” said the girl.

“I will do no such thing,” said the other extravagantly. “As a caballero, it hurts me to discuss money in connection——”

But his lawyer had no sentiment, and had slipped the string from the package and was now busily counting the thousand-franc notes. When he had finished, he put them on the desk.

“Can I see you one moment, M. Brigot?” he asked.

Brigot, holding the girl’s hand and devouring her with his eyes, turned impatiently.

“No, no,” he said. “The document, my friend, the document! Give me a pen!”

“There is one point in the deed I must discuss,” said the lawyer firmly, “if mademoiselle will excuse us for a moment——” He opened the door of his inner office invitingly and with a shrug M. Brigot followed him in.

“I have told you, monsieur,” said the lawyer, “that I do not think your action is wise. You are surrendering a property for a sum less than a quarter of what you paid for it to a perfectly unknown woman——”

“M. l’Avocat,” said the other gravely, “you are speaking of a lady who to me is more precious than life!”

The lawyer concealed a smile.

“I have often spoken to you about ladies who have been more precious to you than life,” he said dryly, “but in their cases, no transfer of valuable property was involved. What do you know of this lady?”

“I know nothing except that she is adorable,” said the reckless Spaniard. “But for the fact that, alas! my wife most obstinately refuses to die or divorce me, I should be honoured to make madame my wife. As it is, what a pleasure to give her the land on which to build a beautiful villa overlooking my gorgeous Tangier—I am moving to Tangier very soon to look after my other property—and to know that her blessed presence——”

The lawyer spread out despairing hands.

“Then there is nothing to be done,” he said. “I only tell you that you are transferring a valuable property to a lady who is comparatively unknown to you, and it seems to me a very indiscreet and reckless thing to do.”

They returned again to the outer apartment, where the girl had been standing nervously twisting the moiré bag in her hand.

“Here is the document, madame,” said the lawyer to her relief. “Señor Brigot will sign here”—he indicated a line—“and you will sign there. I will cause these signatures to be witnessed, and a copy of the document will be forwarded for registration.”

The girl sat down at the table, and her hand shook as she took up the pen. It was at that moment that Jose Ferreira dashed into the room.

He stood open-mouthed at sight of the girl at the table. He tried to speak, but the sound died in his throat. Then he strode forward, under the glaring eye of his employer.

“This woman—this woman!” he gasped.

“Ferreira,” cried Brigot in a terrible voice, “you are speaking of a lady who is my friend!”

“She—she”—the man pointed to her with shaking finger—“she is the woman! She escaped! . . . The woman I told you of, who ran away with an Englishman from Tangier!”

Brigot stared from one to the other.

“You’re mad,” he said.

“She is the woman,” squeaked Ferreira, “and the man also is in Paris. I saw them together this morning at the Café Furnos! The man who was in Tangier, of whom I told the señor, and this woman, Sadie O’Grady!”

Brigot looked at the girl. She had been caught off her guard, and never once had the keen eyes of the lawyer left her. Given some warning, she might have dissembled and carried the matter through with a high hand. But the suddenness of the accusation, the amazingly unexpected vision of Jose, had thrown her off her guard, and Brigot did not need to look twice at her to know that the charges of his subordinate were justified. She was not a born conspirator, nor was she used to intrigues of this character.

Brigot gripped her by the arm and pulled her from the chair. He was half mad with rage and humiliation.

“What is the name of this man?” he hissed. “The name of the man who took you from Tangier and brought you here?”

She was white as death and terribly afraid.

“Benson,” she stammered.

“Benson!”

The lawyer and Brigot uttered the words together, and the Spaniard, releasing his hold stepped back.

“So it was Benson!” he said softly. “Our wonderful Englishman who wanted to swindle me out of my property, eh? And I suppose he sent you, my beautiful American widow, to purchase land for your villa! Now, you can go back to Mr. Benson and tell him that, if my property is good enough for him to buy, it is good enough for me to keep. You—you!”

He made a dart at her with upraised hand, but the lawyer was before him and gently pushed him back.

He jerked his head to the girl and, shaking like a leaf, she stepped to the door and went stumbling down the stairs, which she had mounted with such confidence a few minutes before.

Cartwright received the news with extraordinary equanimity.

“It has saved us the bother of going out of Paris,” he said thoughtfully. “And it was my own fault. I never connected that infernal fellow Ferreira with Brigot’s enterprises. And anyway, we should not have met in public. He said he saw us at the café, did he?”

The girl nodded.

“I did my best,” she faltered.

“Of course you did your best,” said Cartwright, patting her hand. “It is tough luck, but it can’t be helped.”

“There was a long silence, then:

“What about me?” asked the girl. “Where do I come in? I suppose you have no further use for my services?”

Cartwright smiled.

“Of course I have,” he said genially. Then, after a longer pause, “Do you know that you’re the only person in this world that I have ever taken so completely into my confidence and shown what, for a better expression, I will call the seamy side of my business? I’d like to tell you a lot more, because it would be a relief to me to get it off my chest. But I’m telling you this, that if I marry you to-day, you’ll have to play your part to save me from everlasting ruin.”

“Ruin?” she said, startled, and he laughed.

“Not the kind of ruin that means you’ll go short of food,” he said, “but the sort of ruin that may mean—well, ruin from my point of view. Now you must understand this thing clearly, Sadie. I’m out for a big stake, and if I don’t pull it off, it’s as likely as not that I’ll go out. You’re a clever, useful sort of kid, and I have an idea that you may be even more useful. But there’s to be no sentiment in this marriage, mind! You have just to sit here and hold tight and do as you’re told, and you haven’t got to pry into my business any further than I want you to. And if I go away and don’t come back, you must reckon me as dead. I’ve a lot of business in America and elsewhere, which often takes me away for months at a time, and you’re not to get uneasy. But if you don’t hear from me—why, you can go down to the Lafayette and buy yourself the grandest little suit of mourning that you can afford!”

“Shall I be able to afford it?” she asked.

He nodded.

“I shall put some Rentes to your credit at the Lyonnais. That will give you a steady income in case anything happens.”

The girl was troubled.

“I don’t quite like this idea,” she said. “What will happen?”

Mr. Cartwright flicked away the ash from the end of his cigar and said cheerfully:

“That depends entirely upon the view which is taken of a certain prospectus issued in London this morning.”

CHAPTER VI

THE New Angera Syndicate was registered as a private company, and its prospectus was not made public. Officially, the shares were not offered to general subscription, and actually they had been subscribed—or the first issue of five hundred thousand had—by a little group of shrewd speculators in the City of London, who, before now, had made vast sums from Cartwright’s promotions. The five hundred thousand shares brought in about half that number of pounds, and nobody doubted that the properties consolidated for the purposes of flotation included the block of claims described in the prospectus as “lately the property of Señor Brigot.”

Gold had been found on the Angera reef, and gold in sufficient quantity to make the new company a very promising speculation. That Brigot’s property could be made to pay, had it been properly managed, was common knowledge in the City of London. A dozen offers had been made for this concession, but none had been quite acceptable to Señor Brigot, whose estimate of the value of the mine varied with the passing hour.

Probably, had it been possible to secure an interview with M. Brigot at one o’clock in the afternoon, when he arose with a splitting head and a dry throat, his possessions might have been acquired at the price of a quart of sweet champagne.

But, as the day progressed and his views of life became more charitable, his estimate expanded until, by seven o’clock in the evening, which hour he as a rule reserved for any business discussion, his figure was awe-inspiring. Nobody in the City doubted for one moment that Cartwright had purchased the property. Though his system of finance might not commend itself to the barons and even the baronets of Capel Court, there was no question of his honesty.

Was it by some extraordinary fluke that Maxell, who had hitherto shared in the profits of promotion, had kept aloof from this last and greatest of Cartwright’s flutters? No application for shares was ever found. He heard (he said at a subsequent inquiry) in a round-about way of the flotation, and saw a copy of the prospectus, and was a little worried. He knew that when he had left Cartwright in Paris, not only was the Brigot mine outside of his friend’s control, but there was precious little prospect of bringing the Spaniard to a reasonable frame of mind.

Cartwright must have done his work quickly, he thought, and have paid heavily; and this latter reflection worried him even more because he had a fairly accurate idea as to the condition of Cartwright’s private finances. His private thoughts on this occasion are set forth in the report of the Attorney-General’s Committee of Investigation.

He was eating his solitary dinner in Cavendish Square when the telephone bell rang and the voice of Sir Gregory Fane, the Attorney-General, saluted him.

“I should like to see you, Maxell,” he said. “Will you come round to Clarges Street after dinner?”

“Certainly,” replied Maxell promptly, and hung up the receiver, wondering what new difficulties had arisen, which called for a consultation; for he was not on visiting terms with Mr. Attorney.

In the tiny drawing-room of the house occupied by the Cabinet Minister, Maxell was surprised to find another visitor waiting—no less a person than Fenshaw, the Prime Minister’s private secretary.

The Attorney-General came straight to the point.

“Maxell,” he said, “we want your seat in the House of Commons.”

“The deuce you do!” said Maxell, raising his eyebrows.

The Attorney nodded.

“We also want to give you some reward for the excellent services you have rendered to the Government,” he said. “But mostly”—his eyes twinkled—“it is necessary to find a seat for Sir Milton Boyd—the Minister of Education has been defeated at a by-election, as you know.”

The other nodded. The communication was a surprise to him and he wondered exactly what position was to be offered him which would involve his resignation from the House. For one brief, panicky moment he had connected Cartwright and his delinquencies with this request for an interview, but the Attorney’s speech had dispelled that momentary fear.

“Quilland, as you know, has been raised to the Court of Appeal,” said the Attorney, speaking of a well-known Chancery Judge, “and we are departing from our usual practice by bringing over a man from the King’s Bench to take his place. Now, Maxell, how does a judgeship appeal to you?”

The K.C. could only stare.

Of the many things he did not expect, it was elevation to the Bench, although he was a sound, good lawyer, and the Bench is the ambition of every silk.

“I would like that,” he said huskily.

“Good!” said the brisk Attorney. “Then we will regard it as settled. The appointment will not be announced for two or three days, so you’ve a chance of clearing up your more urgent work and preparing a letter for your constituents. You might say a kind word for the new candidate who isn’t particularly popular in your part of the world.”

One of Maxell’s first acts was to write a letter to Cartwright. All Cartwright’s correspondence went to his London office, and was forwarded under separate cover to Paris. It was a long letter, recapitulating their friendly relationship, and ending:

“This promotion, of course, means that we can no longer be associated in business, and I have instructed my broker to sell all the shares I possess in your and other companies forthwith. As you know, I have very definite views about the high prestige of the Bench; and whilst, in any circumstances, I feel that I can go to that dignified position with clean hands, my mind will be freer if I cut all the cords which hold me to commerce of every shape and description.”

Three days later the letter came to Cartwright, and he read it through with a thoughtful expression on his face. He read it twice before he slowly folded it and put it into his inside pocket.

Maxell was to be made a Judge!

He had never considered that contingency, and did not know whether to be pleased or sorry. He was losing the service of a man who had been a directing force in his life, greater than Maxell himself ever imagined. It was not so much the advice which he asked and received from the King’s Counsel, but rather Cartwright had secured help by the simple process of making a study of the other’s moods and expressions.

He knew the half-frown which greeted some schemes, put forward tentatively over the dinner table, and it was that little sign of displeasure which could squash the scheme rather than any considered advice which Maxell might have given. He was losing a good advocate, a very sound legal adviser. He shrugged his shoulders. Well, it did not matter very much. Fate had put a period to an old phase of life, and many things had come to an end coincidently. He was taking his afternoon tea when the letter had arrived, and the new Mrs. Cartwright marked with interest the depression which followed the arrival of the mail.

The new period was beginning excitingly, he thought. He had found a new method of doing business, bolder and more desperate than any he had attempted before; and with this development he had lost a man upon whom he placed a great deal of reliance. Incidentally, he had just been married, but this fact did not bulk very largely in his reckoning. Maxell might serve him yet. The memory of an old business partnership—for in such an aspect did Cartwright interpret their previous relationship—the memory, too, of favours done, of financial dangers shared, might serve him well if things went wrong. Maxell had a pull with the Government—a greater pull, since he was now a Judge of the Supreme Court.

Maxell a Judge! It seemed queer. Cartwright had all the properly constituted Englishman’s reverence for the Bench. In spite of much experience in litigation, and an acquaintance with lawyers of all kinds and stations, he reserved his awe for the god-like creature who sat in wig and gown, and dispensed justice evenhandedly.

“Have you had a worrying letter?” asked the girl.

He shook his head.

“No, no,” he said, a little impatiently; “it is nothing.”

She had hoped for a glimpse of the envelope, but was disappointed. Curiously enough, she ascribed the fact that her husband passed under a strange name and would not divulge his own, to a cause which was far from the truth, and was a great injustice to a man who, if he had not given her his proper name, had given her a title to whatever name he had. That thought she revealed for the first time.

“Do you know what I think?” she said unexpectedly.

“I didn’t know you thought very much,” he smiled. “In what particular department of speculation does your mind wander?”

“Don’t be sarcastic,” she answered. She was a little afraid of sarcasm, as are all children and immature grown-ups. “It was about your name I was thinking.”

He frowned.

“Why the dickens don’t you leave my name alone?” he snapped. “I have told you that it is all for your good that I’m called Benson and known as Benson in this town. When we go to London you will discover my name.”

She nodded.

“I know why you keep it dark.”

He looked at her sharply.

“Why do I keep it dark?” he asked, fixing his eyes on her.

“Because you’re married already.”

He looked at her for a moment, and then burst into such a peal of laughter that the girl knew her shot was wide of the mark.

“You’re a weird person,” he said, getting up. “I’m going out to see an old friend of ours.”

“Of ours?” she asked suspiciously.

“Brigot is the gentleman’s name.”

“He won’t see you,” she said decidedly.

“Oh, won’t he?” said the grim man. “I rather think he will.”

M. Brigot would not willingly have received one whose name was anathema, but Cartwright got over the difficulty of his reception by the simple process of sending up a card inscribed with the name of Brigot’s lawyer.

“You!” spluttered M. Brigot, rising to his feet as the other entered the room and closed the door behind him. “This is an outrage! It is monstrous! You will leave this house immediately, or I will send for the police!”

“Now, just keep quiet for a moment, Brigot,” said Cartwright, seating himself coolly. “I have come to see you as one business man to another.”

“I refuse to discuss any business with you,” stormed his unwilling host. “You are a scoundrel, a conspirator—bah! why do I talk to you?”

“Because you’re broke!” said Cartwright in calm, level tones, and he used the Spanish word for “broke,” which is so much more expressive than any word in English.

The conversation was carried on in this language, for Cartwright had an intimate knowledge of its idioms and even of its patois.

“Your creditors in Paris are gathering round like hawks about a dead cow. Your attempt to sell your Moorish property has been a failure.”

“You know a great deal,” sneered Brigot. “Possibly you also know that I am going to work the mine myself.”

The Englishman chuckled.

“I’ve heard that said of you for years,” said he, “but the truth is, you’re wholly incapable of working anything. You’re one of nature’s little spenders—now, Brigot, don’t let us quarrel. There is a time to end feuds like ours, and this is that time. I am a business man, and so are you. You’re as anxious to sell your property at a good price as I am to buy it. I’ve come to make you an offer.”

M. Brigot laughed sarcastically.

“Ten thousand pounds?” he demanded with gentle irony. “To build a house for a beautiful American widow, eh?”

Cartwright accepted the gibe with a smile.

“I’m not going to show you my hand,” he said.

“It will be infamously dirty,” said M. Brigot, who was in his bright six o’clock mood.

“I know there is gold in the Angera,” the other went on, without troubling to notice the interruption, “and I know that, properly worked, your mine may pay big profits.”

“I will sell out,” said M. Brigot after consideration, “but at a price. I have told you before I will sell out—at a price.”

“But what a price!” said Cartwright, raising his eyebrows and with a gesture of extravagant despair. “It is all the money in the world!”

“Nevertheless, it is the price,” said M. Brigot comfortably.

“I’ll tell you what I am willing to do.” Cartwright stroked his chin as though the solution had just occurred to him. “I will float your property in London, tacking on a number of other properties which I have bought in the neighbourhood. I am willing to pay you two hundred thousand pounds—that is to say, six million francs.”

M. Brigot was interested. He was so interested that, for the moment, he could forget his animosity and private grievances. It was true that, as Cartwright had said, his creditors were becoming noisy.

“In cash, of course?” he said suddenly.

Cartwright shook his head.

“You can have a portion in cash and the rest in shares.”

“Bah!” Brigot snapped his fingers. “I also can issue shares, my friend. What are shares? Pieces of paper which are not worth their ink. No, no, you deceive me. I thought you had come to me with a genuine offer. There is no business to be done between you and me, Mr. Cartwright. Good evening.”

Cartwright did not move.

“A portion in cash—say, fifteen thousand pounds,” he suggested; “that is a lot of money.”

“To you—yes, but not to me,” said the magnificent Brigot. “Give me two-thirds in cash and I will take the rest in shares. That is my last word.”

Cartwright rose.

“This offer is open until—when?”

“Until to-morrow at this hour,” replied Brigot.

As Cartwright was going, a man tapped at the door. It was Brigot’s “secretary,” who was also his valet. He handed a telegram to the Spaniard, and Brigot opened and read. He was a long time digesting its contents, and Cartwright waited for a favourable opportunity to say good-bye. All the time his mind was working, and he thought he saw daylight. Two-thirds of the money could be raised, and he could breathe again.

Presently Brigot folded up the telegram and put it in his pocket, and there was on his face a beatific smile.

“Good night, Señor Brigot,” said Cartwright. “I will see you to-morrow with the money.”

“It will have to be big money, my friend,” said Brigot, and there was a note of exultation in his voice. “To buy my little property will cost you half a million English pounds.”

Cartwright gasped.

“What do you mean?” he demanded quickly.

“Do you know Solomon Brothers, the financiers of London?”

“I know them very well,” replied Cartwright steadily. He had good reason to know Solomon Brothers, who had taken a large block of shares in his new syndicate.

“I have just had a telegram from Solomon Brothers,” said Señor Brigot, speaking slowly, “and they ask me to give them the date when my property was transferred to your syndicate. They tell me it is included in your properties which you have floated. You know best, Mr. Cartwright, whether my little mine is worth half a million English pounds to you—especially if I put a date agreeable to you.”

“Blackmail, eh?” said Cartwright between his teeth, and without a word left the room.

CHAPTER VII

HE went straight back to his flat on the Avenue of the Grand Army, and the girl could see by his face that something had happened.

“You might pack my bag, will you?” he said almost brusquely. “I have a letter or two to write. I’m going to London. Important business has arisen, and I may be gone some time.”

Wisely she asked no questions, but carried out his instructions. When she came back from the room with a little gripsack packed, he was blotting the envelope of the last letter.

“Post these after I have gone,” he said.

“Shall I come down to the station and see you off?”

He shook his head.

“The less you and I are seen together, the better, I think,” he said with a faint smile.

He opened a drawer of his desk and took out a cash-box. From this he extracted a thick wad of notes, and, counting them rapidly, he tossed a respectable bundle into her lap.

“You may want this,” he said. “You know you have a regular income, but you must keep in touch with the Lyonnais. For the moment I should advise you to go to”—he looked at the ceiling for inspiration—“to Nice or Monte Carlo. Keep away from the tables,” he added humorously.

“But—but,” said the bewildered girl, “for how long will you be gone? Can’t I come with you?”

“That is impossible,” he said sharply. “You must go to the South of France, leave by to-night’s train. Give your address to nobody, and take another name if necessary.”

“Are things very wrong?”

“Pretty bad,” he said. “But don’t worry. I may be gone for a year, even more. There are plenty of things you can do, but don’t go back into the profession yet awhile.”

“I thought of taking up cinema work,” she said.

He nodded.

“You might do worse than go to America—if I am a long time gone.”

He stuffed the remainder of the notes into his pocket, picked up his bag, and with no other farewell than a curt nod, left her.

She was only to see him once again in her life-time.

He crossed the Channel by the night boat and came to London in the early hours of the morning. He drove straight away to his hotel, had a bath and shaved. His plan was fairly well formed. Everything depended upon the charity which Messrs. Solomon Brothers might display towards his strange lapse.

At breakfast he read in The Times that “Mr. Justice Maxell took his seat upon the Bench” on the previous day, and that paragraph, for some reason, seemed to cheer him.

At ten o’clock he was in the City. At half-past ten he was interviewing the senior partner of Solomon Brothers, a man with an expressionless face, who listened courteously to the somewhat lame excuses which Cartwright offered.

“It was a mistake of a blundering clerk,” said Cartwright airily. “As soon as I discovered the error, I came back to London to withdraw all the money which had been subscribed.”

“It is a pity you didn’t come back yesterday, Mr. Cartwright,” said Solomon.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” said the other, “that we have already placed this matter in the hands of our solicitors. I suggest that you had better interview them.”

Cartwright made a further pilgrimage to the solicitors of Solomon Brothers, and found them most unwilling to see him. That was an ominous sign, and he went back to his office in Victoria Street conscious that a crisis was at hand. At any rate, the girl was out of the way; but, what was more important, she, one of the principal witnesses in so far as Brigot and his property were concerned, was not available for those who might bring a charge against him. She was his wife, and her lips were sealed, and this consequence of his marriage was one which he had not wholly overlooked when he had contracted his strange alliance.

What a fool he had been! The property might have been transferred and in his hands, if he had not antagonised a wretched little Spanish theatrical manager. But, he reflected, if he had not antagonised that manager, he would not have possessed the instrument for extracting the transfer from the amorous Brigot.

At the top of a heap of letters awaiting him was one written in a firm boyish hand, and Cartwright made a little grimace, as though for the first time recognising his responsibility.

“Take A Chance Anderson; my lad, you will have to take a chance,” he said, and pushed the letter aside unopened.

He lunched at his club, sent a brief letter to Maxell, and returned to his office at two in the afternoon. His clerk told him that a man was waiting for him in the inner office. Cartwright hesitated with his hand on the door; then, setting his teeth, he stepped in.

The stranger rose.

“Are you Mr. Alfred Cartwright?” he asked.

“That is my name,” replied Cartwright.

“I am Inspector Guilbury, of the City Police,” said the stranger, “and I shall take you into custody on charges under the Companies Act, and a further charge of conspiracy to defraud.”

Cartwright laughed.

“Go ahead,” he said.

All the week preceding the trial, Cartwright’s heart was filled with warm, gratitude to his erstwhile friend. He did not doubt, when his solicitor told him that Mr. Justice Maxell would try his case, that Maxell had gone a long way out of his way to get himself appointed the Old Bailey judge. How like Maxell it was—that queer, solemn stick—and how loyal!

Cartwright had a feeling for Maxell which he had never had before. At first he had feared the embarrassment which might be Maxell’s at having to try a case in which an old friend was implicated, and had even hoped that the new judge would have nothing to do with the trial. He did not despair of Maxell pulling strings on his behalf, and he realised that much could be done by judicious lobbying.

The charge against him was a grave one. He had not realised how serious it was until he had seen that respectful array of counsel in the Lord Mayor’s Court, and had heard his misdemeanours reduced to cold legal phraseology. But he did not wholly despair. Brigot had been coming to London to give evidence, and on his journey there had occurred an incident which suggested to the accused man that Providence was fighting on his side. The Spaniard had had a stroke in the train to Calais, and the doctors reported that he might not recover. Not that Brigot’s evidence was indispensable. There was, apparently, a letter and two telegrams in existence, in the course of which Brigot denied that he had ever parted with his property; and the onus lay upon Cartwright to prove that he had acted in a bona fide manner—that was impossible of proof, and nobody knew this better than Cartwright.

And ever his mind reverted to the singular act of generosity on the part of his old friend. He did not doubt for one moment that Maxell had “worked” the case so that it fell to him to try it.

It was a bright morning in May when he came up the steps of the Old Bailey and took his place in the dock. Almost immediately after, the Judge and the Sheriff entered from the door behind the plain oaken bench. How well the judicial robes became Maxell, thought Cartwright. He bowed slightly and received as slight a bow in reply. Maxell was looking pale. His face was drawn, and there was resolution in his speech and in his eyes.

“Before this case proceeds,” he said, “I wish to direct attention to a statement in one of the newspapers this morning, that I was associated with the accused in business, and that I am in some way involved, directly or indirectly, in the company promotion—either as a shareholder or an indirect promoter—which is the subject of the present charge. I wish to utter an emphatic denial to that statement.”

He spoke clearly and slowly and looked the prisoner straight in the eye, and Cartwright nodded.

“I can only endorse your lordship’s statement,” he said emphatically. “Your lordship has never had any dealings with me or any business transactions whatsoever.”

It was a minor sensation which provided a headline for the evening newspapers. The case proceeded. It was not particularly involved and the witnesses were few but vital. There were those business men who had subscribed or promised to subscribe to the syndicate. There was Mr. Solomon, who could give an account of his dealings with the prisoner. But, most damning of all, was a sworn statement made by Brigot before an English solicitor, a Commissioner of Oaths. And it was such a statement which only documentary proof, produced by the accused man, could refute.

Cartwright listened to the evidence untroubled of mind. He knew that his counsel’s speech, delivered with such force, was little less than an admission of guilt and a plea for mercy. The last word would be with the judge. A verdict of “guilty” there must necessarily be. But he thought that, when later his counsel pleaded for a minimum sentence, he saw a responsive look in the Judge’s eyes.

The stigma of imprisonment did not greatly distress Cartwright. He had lived on the narrow border-line of illegalities too long; he had weighed chances and penalties too nicely to bother about such ephemeral things as “honour.” His system of finance was reviewed, and certain minor charges arising out of the manipulation of funds were gone into. It was late in the evening when the Judge began his summing up.

It was a fair, if a conventional address he delivered to the jury. Obviously, thought Cartwright, he could do nothing less than call attention to the serious nature of the charge, the interests involved, the betrayal of shareholders, and the like. On the whole, the summing up did not diminish the comforting sense that the worst that lay before him was a few months’ imprisonment and then a start in another land under another name. He never doubted his ability to make money. The summing up was ended, and the jury retired. They were gone twenty minutes, and when they came back it was a foregone conclusion what their verdict would be.

“Do you find the prisoner at the bar guilty or not guilty?”

“Guilty,” was the reply.

“And is that the verdict of you all?”

“It is.”

Mr. Justice Maxell was examining his notes, and presently he closed the little book which he was consulting.

“The charge against Alfred Cartwright,” he said, “is one of the most serious which could be brought against a business man. The jury have returned a verdict of guilty, and I must say that I concur in that verdict. I am here in my place”—his voice shook a little—“to administer and maintain the laws of England. I must do all that in me is possible to preserve the purity of commercial life and the condition of English commercial honesty.”

Cartwright waited for that “but”—it did not come.

“In view of the seriousness of the frauds and irregularities which the accused has committed, with a cynical disregard for the happiness or fortune of those people whose interests should have been his own, I cannot do less than pass a sentence which will serve as an example to all wrongdoers.”

Cartwright gasped and gripped the edge of the dock.

“You, Alfred Cartwright,” said Maxell, and again looked him straight in the eye, “will be kept in penal servitude for twenty years.”

Cartwright swallowed something. Then he leaned across the edge of the dock.

“You swine!” he said huskily, and then the warders dragged him away.

Two days later there was a new sensation. The newspapers announced that Mr. Justice Maxell had been compelled, on account of ill-health, to resign from the Bench, and that His Majesty had been pleased to confer a baronetcy of the United Kingdom upon the ex-Judge.

CHAPTER VIII

SOME nine years after the events detailed in the last chapter, a fairly clever young actress who had drifted into the cinematograph business, faced one of the many disappointments which had made up her life. In many ways the disappointment was more bitter than any she had previously experienced, because she had banked so heavily upon success.

If there was any satisfaction to be had out of the new tragedy it was to be found in the fact that the fault was not entirely hers. An impartial critic might, indeed, absolve her from all responsibility.

In this particular instance she regarded herself in the light of a martyr to indifferent literature—not without reason.

When the Westminster Art Film Company was tottering on its last legs, Mr. Willie Ellsberger, chairman and chief victim, decided on one big throw for fortune. The play decided upon does not matter, because it was written by Willie himself, with the assistance of his advertising man, but it contained all the stunts that had ever got by in all the photo plays that had ever been produced, and in and out of every breathless situation flashed Sadie O’Grady, the most amazing, the most charming, the most romantic, the highest salaried artiste that filmland had ever known.

Sadie O’Grady had come to London from Honolulu, after she had inherited her father’s considerable fortune. She came, a curious visitor, to the studios, merely as a spectator, and had laughingly refused Mr. Ellsberger’s first offer, that gentleman having been attracted by her perfect face and the grace of her movements; but at last, after extraordinary persuasion, she had agreed to star in that stupendous production, “The Soul of Babylon,” for a fee of £25,000, which was to be distributed amongst certain Honolulu charities in which she was interested.

“No,” she told a newspaper man, “this is to be my first and my last film. I enjoy the work very much, but naturally it takes up a great deal of my time.”

“Are you returning to Honolulu?” asked our representative.

“No,” replied Miss O’Grady, “I am going on to Paris. My agent has bought me the Duc de Montpelier’s house in the Avenue d’Etoile.”

A week after the picture was finished, Miss Sadie O’Grady waited on the chairman by appointment.

“Well, Sadie,” said that gentleman, leaning back in his chair, and smiling unhappily, “it’s a flivver!”

“You don’t say!” said Sadie aghast.

“We ran it off for the big renter from the North, and he says it is about as bad as it can be, and that all the good in it is so obviously stolen, that he dare not risk the injunction which would follow the first exhibition. Did Simmonds pay you your last week’s salary?”

“No, Mr. Ellsberger,” said the girl.

Ellsberger shrugged.

“That sets me back another twenty pounds,” he said and reached for his cheque-book. “It is tough on you, Sadie, but it’s tougher on us. I’m not so sure that it is so tough on you, though. I spent a fortune advertising you. There isn’t anybody in this country who hasn’t heard of Sadie O’Grady, and,” he added grimly, “you’ve more publicity than I hope I shall get when this business goes into the hands of the Official Receiver.”

“So there’s no more work?” asked the girl after a pause.

Mr. Ellsberger’s hands said: “What can I do?”

“You ought not to have any difficulty in getting a shop,” he said, “with your figure.”

“Especially when the figure’s twenty pounds a week,” she said unsmilingly. “I was a fool ever to leave Paris. I was doing well there and I wish I’d never heard of the cinema business.”

Still young and pretty and slim, with a straight nose and a straighter mouth, she had no appeal for Mr. Ellsberger, who in matters of business had an unsympathetic nature.

“Why don’t you go back to Paris?” he said, speaking very deliberately and looking out of the window. “Perhaps that affair has blown over by now.”

“What affair?” she asked sharply. “What do you mean?”

“I’ve friends in Paris,” said the chairman, “good, bright boys who go around a lot, and they know most of what’s going on in town.”

She looked at him, biting her lips thoughtfully.

“Reggie van Rhyn—that’s the trouble you heard about?”

Mr. Ellsberger nodded.

“I didn’t know what happened, and I’ll never believe in a thousand years that I stabbed him,” she said vigorously. “I’ve always been too much of a lady for that sort of thing—I was educated at a convent.”

Mr. Ellsberger yawned.

“Take that to Curtis, will you,” he said. “If he can get any free publicity for you, why, I’ll be glad. Now take my advice—stay on. I’ve put Sadie O’Grady way up amongst the well-known products of Movieland, and you’ll be a fool if you quit just when the public is getting interested in you. I’m in bad, but that doesn’t affect you, Sadie, and there ain’t a producer in England who wouldn’t jump at you and give you twice the salary I’m paying.”

She stood up, undecided. Ellsberger was growing weary of the interview. He made a great show of pulling out notepaper and rang the bell for his stenographer.

“The publicity’s fine,” she admitted, “and I’ve felt good about the work. Why the letters that I’ve had from people asking for my autograph and pictures of my Honolulu estate”—she smiled a little frostily—“people in society, too. Why, a titled man who wrote to me from Bournemouth, Sir John Maxell——”

“Sir John Maxell!”

Mr. Ellsberger was interested, indeed, he was fascinated. He waved away his stenographer.

“Sit down, Sadie,” he said. “You’re sure it was Maxell? Sir John Maxell?”

She nodded.

“That’s him,” she said. “There’s class there.”

“And there’s money, too,” said the practical Ellsberger. “Why don’t you get in touch with him, Sadie? A fellow like that would think nothing of putting ten thousand into a picture if he was interested in a girl. If you happen to be the girl, Sadie, there’ll be a thousand pound contract for you right away.”

Her straight lips were a trifle hard.

“What you want is an angel, and the Judge is the best kind of angel you could wish for.”

“Has he got money?” she asked.

“Money!” said the hands of Ellsberger. “What a ridiculous question to ask!”

“Money!” he scoffed. “Money to burn. Do you mean to say you’ve never heard of Sir John Maxell, never heard of the man who sent his best friend to gaol for twenty years? Why, it was the biggest sensation of the year!”

Sadie was not very interested in history, but momentarily, by virtue of the very warm and well punctuated letter which reposed in her bag, she was interested in Sir John.

“Is he married?” asked the girl naturally.

“He is not married,” said Ellsberger emphatically.

“Any children?”

“There are no children, but he has a niece—he’s got some legal responsibility as regards her; I remember seeing it in the newspapers, he’s her guardian or something.”

Mr. Ellsberger looked at the girl with a speculative eye.

“Have you his letter?”

She nodded and produced the epistle.

It was polite but warm. It had some reference to her “gracious talent,” to her “unexampled beauty” which had “brought pleasure to one who was no longer influenced by the commonplace,” and it finished up by expressing the hope that they two would meet in the early future, and that before leaving for Paris she would honour him by being his guest for a few days.

Ellsberger handed the letter back.

“Write him,” he said, “and, Sadie, consider yourself engaged for another week—write to him in my time. He’s fallen for all that Press stuff, and maybe, if he’s got that passionate admiration for your genius he’ll—say, you don’t want to stay in the picture business and finish by marrying that kind of trouble, do you?”

He pointed through the wide windows to a youth who was coming across from the studio to the office, swinging a cane vigorously.

“Observe the lavender socks and the wrist watch,” he chuckled. “But don’t make any mistake about Timothy Anderson. He’s the toughest amateur at his weight in this or any other state and a good boy, but he’s the kind of fellow that women like you marry—get acquainted with the Judge.”

With only a preliminary knock, which he did not wait to hear answered, the young man had swung through the door, hat in hand.

“How do, Miss O’Grady?” he said. “I saw your picture—fine! Good acting, but a perfectly rotten play. I suppose you wrote it, Ellsberger?”

“I wrote it,” admitted that gentleman gloomily.

“It bears the impression of your genius, old bird.”

Timothy Anderson shook his head reproachfully.

“It only wanted you as the leading man, and it would have been dead before we put the titles in,” said Ellsberger with a grin.

“I’m out of the movies for good,” said Timothy Anderson, sitting himself on a table. “It is a demoralising occupation—which reminds me.”

He slipped from the table, thrust his hand into his pocket, and producing a roll of notes:

“I owe you twenty-five pounds, Ellsberger,” he said. “Thank you very much. You saved me from ruin and starvation.”

He counted the money across, and Mr. Ellsberger was undoubtedly surprised and made no attempt to conceal the fact. So surprised was he that he could be jocose.

“Fixed a big contract with Mary Pickford?” he asked.

“N-no,” said Timothy, “but I struck a roulette game—and took a chance.”

“Took a chance again, eh?” said Ellsberger. “One of these days you’ll take a chance and never get better of it.”

“Pooh!” said the other in derision. “Do you think that’s any new experience for me? Not on your life. I went into this game with just twelve pounds and my hotel bill three weeks in arrears. I was down to my last half-crown, but I played it and came out with three hundred pounds.”

“Whose game was it?” asked Mr. Ellsberger curiously.

“Tony Smail,” and Mr. Ellsberger whistled.

“Why, that’s one of the toughest places in town,” he said. “It is a wonder you came away with the money—and your life.”

“I took a chance,” said the other carelessly, and swung his legs once more over the edge of the desk. “There was some slight trouble when I came out of Smail’s,” he shrugged his shoulders, “just a little horseplay.”

The girl had followed the conversation keenly. Any talk which circled about finance had the effect of concentrating her attention.

“Do you always take a chance?” she asked.

“Always,” said the other promptly.

This woman did not appeal to him. Timothy possessed a seventh sense which he called his “Sorter,” and Miss Sadie O’Grady was already sorted into the heap of folks who, had life been a veritable voyage, would have been labelled “Not Wanted.”

He held out his hand to Ellsberger.

“I’m going by the next boat to New York,” he said, “then I’ll go to California. Maybe I’ll take in Kempton on my way, for a fellow I met at the hotel has a horse running which can catch pigeons. Good-bye, Miss O’Grady. I wish you every kind of luck.”

She watched him disappear, sensing his antagonism and responding thereto. If he could judge women by intuition, she judged him by reason, and she knew that here was a man whose mental attitude was one of dormant hostility.

It would be unfair to her to say that it was because she recognised the clean mind and the healthy outlook and the high principles of this young man that she disliked him. She was not wholly bad, because she had been the victim of circumstances and had lately lived a two-thousand pound life on a one-hundred pound capacity. She looked after him, biting her lips as though she were solving a great problem.

Presently she turned to Ellsberger.

“I’ll write to Sir John,” she said.

By a curious coincidence Timothy Anderson had the idea of approaching Sir John Maxell also, though nearly a year passed before he carried his idea into execution.

CHAPTER IX

THE initials “T. A. C.” before young Mr. Anderson’s name stood for Timothy Alfred Cartwright, his pious but practical parent having, by this combination, made a bid for the protection of the saints and the patronage of Cousin Al Cartwright, reputedly a millionaire and a bachelor. It was hoped in this manner that his position on earth and in heaven would be equally secure.

What Timothy’s chances are in the hereafter the reader must decide; but we do know that Cousin Al Cartwright proved both a weak reed and a whited sepulchre. Timothy’s parents had departed this life two years after Alfred Cartwright had disappeared from public view, leaving behind him two years’ work for a committee of Investigating Accounts.

When his surviving parent died, the boy was at school, and if he was not a prodigy of learning he was at least brilliant in parts.

Though it was with no great regret that he left school, he was old enough and shrewd enough to realise that a bowing acquaintance with the differential calculus, and the ability to conjugate the verb “avoir” did not constitute an equipment, sufficiently comprehensive (if you will forgive these long words), to meet and defeat such enemies to human progress as he was likely to meet in this cruel and unsympathetic world.

He had a small income bequeathed by his mother in a will which was almost apologetic because she left so little, and he settled himself down as a boarder in the house of a schoolmaster, and took up those branches of study which interested him, and set himself to forget other branches of education which interested him not at all.

Because of his ineradicable passion for challenging fate it was only natural that “T. A. C.” should bear a new significance, and since some genius had christened him “Take A Chance” Anderson the name stuck. And he took chances. From every throw with fate he learnt something. He had acquired some knowledge of boxing at school, and had learnt enough of the art to enable him to head the school. Such was his faith in himself and his persuasive eloquence that he induced Sam Murphy, ex-middle-weight and proprietor of the Stag’s Head, Dorking, to nominate and support him for a ten-rounds contest with that redoubtable feather-weight, Bill Schenk.

“Take A Chance” Anderson took his chance. He also took the count in the first round, and, returning to consciousness, vowed a vow—not that he would never again enter the ring, but that he would learn something more of the game before he did. Of course, it was very disgraceful that a man of his antecedents should become a professional boxer—for professional he became in the very act of failure—but that worried him not at all.

It is a matter of history that Bill Schenk was knocked out by Kid Muldoon, and that twelve months after his initiation into the prize ring “T. Anderson” fought twenty rounds with the Kid and got the decision on points. Thereafter, the ring knew “Take A Chance” Anderson no more.

He took a chance on race-courses, backing horses that opened at tens and closed at twenties. He backed horses that had never won before on the assumption that they must win some time. He had sufficient money left after this adventure to buy a book of form. He devoted his undoubted talent to the study of other games of chance. He played cards for matches with a broker’s clerk, who harboured secret ambitions of going to Monte Carlo with a system; he purchased on the hire system wonderfully cheap properties on the Isle of Thanet—and he worked.

For all his fooling and experimenting, for all his gambling and his chancing, Timothy never let a job of work get past him, if he could do it, and when he wasn’t working for sordid lucre he was working for the good of his soul. He went to the races with a volume of Molière’s plays under his arm, and between events he read, hereby acquiring the respect of the racing fraternity as an earnest student of form.

So he came by violent, yet to him easy, stages to Movieland—that Mecca which attracts all that is enterprising and romantic and restless. He took a chance in a juvenile lead, but his method and his style of actions were original. Producers are for ever on the look out for novelty, but they put the bar up against novel styles of acting and expression. Ellsberger had tried him out because he had known his father, but more because he had won money over him when he had beaten Kid Muldoon; but even Ellsberger was compelled to suggest that Timothy put in two long years “atmosphering” before he essayed an individual rôle on the screen.

Timothy was not certain whether his train left at ten minutes to seven or at ten minutes past seven, so he arrived in time for the ten minutes to seven, which was characteristic of him, because he never took a chance against the inflexible systems.

He reached New York without misadventure, but on his way westward he stayed over at Nevada. He intended spending a night, but met a man with a scheme for running a mail-order business on entirely new lines, invested his money, and by some miracle managed to make it last a year. At the end of that time the police were after his partner, and Timothy was travelling eastward by easy stages.

He came back to New York with fifty-five dollars which he had won from a Westerner on the last stage of the journey. The track ran for about twenty miles along the side of the road, the wager between them was a very simple one; it was whether they would pass more men than women on the road. The Westerner chose men and Timothy chose women. For every man they saw Timothy paid a dollar, for every woman he received a dollar. In the agreed hour they passed fifty-five more women than they passed men and Timothy was that many dollars richer. There were never so many women abroad as there were that bright afternoon, and the Westerner couldn’t understand it until he realised that it was Sunday—a fact which Timothy had grasped before he had made his wager.

Two months later he was back in London. How he got back he never explained. He stayed in London only long enough to fit himself up with a new kit before he presented himself at a solid mansion in Branksome Park, Bournemouth. Years and years before, Sir John Maxell had written to him, asking him to call upon him for any help he might require, and promising to assist him in whatever difficulties he might find himself. Timothy associated the offer with the death of his father—maybe they were friends.

He was shown into the sunny drawing-room bright with flowers, and he looked round approvingly. He had lived in other people’s houses all his life—schools, boarding-houses, hotels and the like—and an atmosphere of home came to him like the forgotten fragrance of a garden he had known.

The servant came back.

“Sir John will see you in ten minutes, sir, but you must not keep him long, because he has to go out to meet Lady Maxell.”

“Lady Maxell?” asked Timothy in surprise, “I didn’t know he was married.”

The servant smiled and said:

“The Judge married a year ago, sir. It was in all the newspapers.”

“I don’t read all the newspapers,” said Timothy. “I haven’t sufficient time. Who was the lady?”

The man looked round, as if fearing to be overheard.

“Sir John married the cinema lady, Miss Sadie O’Grady,” he said, and the hostility in his tone was unmistakable.

Timothy gasped.

“You don’t say!” he said. “Well, that beats the band! Why, I knew that da——, that lady in London!”

The servant inclined his head sideways.

“Indeed, sir,” he said, and it was evident that he did not regard Timothy as being any fitter for human association by reason of his confession.

A distant bell buzzed.

“Sir John is ready, sir,” he said. “I hope you will not mention the fact that I spoke of madam?”

Timothy winked, and was readmitted to the confidence of the democracy.

Sir John Maxell was standing up behind his writing table, a fine, big man with his grey hair neatly brushed back from his forehead and his blue eyes magnified behind rimless glasses.

“T. A. C. Anderson,” he said, coming round the table with slow steps. “Surely this is not the little Timothy I heard so much about years and years ago!”

“That is I, sir,” said Timothy.

“Well, well,” said Maxell, “I should never have known you. Sit down, my boy. You smoke, of course—everybody smokes nowadays, but it seems strange that a boy I knew in short breeches should have acquired the habit. I’ve heard about you,” he said, as Timothy lit his cigar.

“Nothing to my discredit, I hope, sir?”

Maxell shook his head.

“I have heard about you,” he repeated diplomatically, “let it go at that. Now I suppose you’ve come here because, five years ago, on the twenty-third of December to be correct, I wrote to you, offering to give you any help that lay in my power.”

“I won’t swear to the date,” said Tim.

“But I will,” smiled the other. “I never forget a date, I never forget a letter, I never forget the exact wording of that letter. My memory is an amazing gift. Now just tell me what I can do for you.”

Timothy hesitated.

“Sir John,” he said, “I have had a pretty bad time in America. I’ve been running in a team with a crook and I’ve had to pay out every cent I had in the world.”

Sir John nodded slowly.

“Then it is money you want,” he said, without enthusiasm.

“Not exactly money, sir, but I’m going to try to start in London and I thought, maybe, you might give me a letter of introduction to somebody.”

“Ah, well,” said Maxell, brightening up, “I think I can do that for you. What did you think of doing in London?”

“I thought of getting some sort of secretarial job,” he said. “Not that I know much about it!”

Sir John pinched his lower lip.

“I know a man who may help you,” he said. “We were in the House of Commons together and he would give you a place in one of his offices, but unfortunately for you he has made a great deal of money and spends most of his time at Newmarket.”

“Newmarket sounds good to me,” said Timothy “Why, I’d take a chance there. Perhaps he’d try me out in that office?”

The Judge permitted himself to smile.

“In Newmarket,” he said, “our friend does very little more, I fear, than waste his time and money on the race-course. He has half a dozen horses—I had a letter from him this morning.”

He walked back to his table, searched in the litter, and presently amongst the papers pulled out a letter.

“As a matter of fact, I had some business with him and I wrote to him for information. The only thing he tells me is”—this with a gesture of despair—“that Skyball and Polly Chaw—those are the names of race-horses, I presume—will win the two big handicaps next week and that he has a flyer named Swift Kate that can beat anything—I am quoting his words—on legs over six furlongs.”

He looked up over his glasses at Timothy, and on that young man’s face was a seraphic smile.

“Newmarket sounds real nice to me,” glowed Timothy.

Remembering the injunctions of the servant, he was taking his adieu, when his host asked, in a lower voice than that in which the conversation had been carried on:

“I suppose you have not heard from your cousin?”

Timothy looked at him in astonishment. Had Sir John asked after the Grand Llama of Tibet he would have been as well prepared to answer.

“Why, no, sir—no—er—is he alive?”

Sir John Maxell looked at him sharply.

“Alive? Of course. I thought you might have heard from him.”

Timothy shook his head.

“No, sir,” he said, “he disappeared. I only met him once when I was a kid. Was he a friend—er—an acquaintance of yours?”

Sir John was drumming his fingers on the desk and his mind was far away.

“Yes and no,” he said shortly. “I knew him, and at one time I was friendly with him.”

Suddenly he glanced at his watch, and a look of consternation came to his face.

“Great heavens!” he cried. “I promised to meet my wife a quarter of an hour ago. Good-bye! Good-bye!”

He hand-shook Timothy from the room and the young man had to find his way downstairs without guidance, because the manservant was at that moment heavily engaged.

From the floor below came a shrill, unpleasant sound, and Timothy descended to find himself in the midst of a domestic crisis. There were two ladies in the hall—one a mere silent, contained spectator, the other the principal actress. He recognised her at once, but she did not see him, because her attention was directed to the red-faced servant.

“When I ring you on the ’phone, I expect to be answered,” she was saying. “You’ve nothing to do except to sit round and keep your ears open, you big, lazy devil!”

“But, my lady, I——”

“Don’t answer me,” she stormed. “If you think I’ve nothing better to do than to sit at a ’phone waiting till you wake up, why, you’re mistaken—that’s all. And if Sir John doesn’t fire you——”

“Don’t worry about Sir John firing me,” said the man with a sudden change of manner. “I’ve just had about as much of you as I can stand. You keep your bossing for the movies, Lady Maxell. You’re not going to try any of that stuff with me!”

She was incapable of further speech, nor was there any necessity for it since the man turned on his heels and disappeared into that mysterious region which lies at the back of every entrance hall. Then for the first time she saw Timothy.

“How do you do, Lady Maxell?”

She glared round at the interrupter, and for a moment he thought she intended venting her anger on him. She was still frowning when he took her limp hand.

“You’re the Anderson boy, aren’t you?” she asked a little ungraciously.

The old sense of antagonism was revived and intensified in him at the touch of her hand. She was unchanged, looking, if anything, more pretty than when he had seen her last, but the hardness at her mouth was accentuated, and she had taken on an indefinable air of superiority which differed very little from sheer insolence.

A gold-rimmed lorgnette came up to survey him, and he was nettled—only women had the power to annoy him.

“You haven’t changed a bit,” he bantered. “I’m sorry your eyesight is not so good as it was. Studio life is pretty tough on the eyes, isn’t it?”

She closed her lorgnette with a snap, and turned to the girl.

“You’d better see what Sir John is doing,” she said. “Ask him what he thinks I am, that I should wait in the hall like a tramp.”

It was then that the girl came out of the shadow and Timothy saw her.

“This is the ward or niece,” he said to himself, and sighed, for never had he seen a human creature who so satisfied his eye. There is a beauty which is neither statuesque nor cold, nor to be confounded with prettiness. It is a beauty which depends upon no regularity of feature or of colour, but which has its reason in its contradictions.

The smiling Madonna whom Leonardo drew had such contradictory quality as this girl possessed. For she was ninety per cent. child, and carried in her face all the bubbling joy of youth. Yet she impressed Timothy as being strange and unnatural. Her meekness, her ready obedience to carry out the woman’s instruction, the very dignity of her departure—these things did not fit with the character he read in her face. Had she turned curtly to this insolent woman and told her to carry her message herself, or had she flown up the stairs calling for Sir John as she went, these things would have been natural.

Lady Maxell turned upon him.

“And see here, Mr. What’s-your-name, if you’re a friend of Sir John, you’ll forget that I was ever in a studio. There are enough stories about me in Bournemouth without your adding to the collection.”

“Mother’s little thoroughbred!” said Timothy admiringly; “spoken like a true little lady.”

In some respects he was wholly undisciplined, and had never learnt the necessity of refraining from answering back. And the woman irritated him, and irritation was a novel sensation.

Her face was dark with rage, but it was upon Sir John, descending in haste to meet his offended wife, that she turned the full batteries of her anger.

“You didn’t know the time, of course. Your watch has stopped. It is hard enough for me to keep my end up without you helping to make me look foolish!”

“My dear,” protested Maxell in a flurry, “I assure you——”

“You can spend your time with this sort of trash,” she indicated Timothy, and Timothy bowed, “but you keep me waiting like a tailor’s model at Sotheby’s, of all people in the world, when you know well enough——”

“My dear,” pleaded the lawyer wearily, “my watch has certainly stopped——”

“Ah! You make me tired. What are you doing with this fellow? Do you think I want reminding of movie days? Everybody knows this fellow—a cheap gambler, who’s been fired out of every studio in England. You allow your servants to insult me—and now I suppose you’ve brought this prize-fighter to keep me in my place,” and she pointed scornfully at the amused Timothy.

Half-way downstairs the girl stood watching the scene in silence, and it was only when he became conscious of her presence that Timothy began to feel a little uncomfortable.

“Well, good-bye, Sir John,” he said. “I’m sorry I intruded.”

“Wait,” said the woman. “John, this man has insulted me! I don’t know what he’s come for, but I suppose he wants something. He’s one of those shifty fellows that hang around studios begging for money to bet with. If you raise a hand to help him, why, I’m finished with you.”

“I assure you,” said Sir John in his most pompous manner, “that this young man has asked for nothing more than a letter of introduction. I have a duty——”

“Stop!” said the woman. “You’ve a duty to me, too. Hold fast to your money. Likely as not, you’ll do neither with ‘Take A Chance’ Anderson floating around.”

It was not her words, neither the contempt in her voice nor the insult which stung him. The man who went twenty rounds with Kid Muldoon had learnt to control his temper, but there was a new factor present—a factor who wore a plain grey dress, and had two big, black eyes which were now solemnly surveying him.

“Lady Maxell,” he said, “it is pretty difficult to give the lie to any woman, but I tell you that what you say now is utterly false. I had no intention when I came to Bournemouth of asking for anything that would cost Sir John a penny. As to my past, I suppose it has been a little eccentric, but it is clean, Lady Maxell.”

He meant no more than he said. He had no knowledge of Sadie O’Grady’s antecedents, or he might not have emphasised the purity of his own. But the woman went back as though she had been whipped, and Timothy had a momentary vision of a charging fury, before she flung herself upon him, tearing at his face, shrieking aloud in her rage. . .

“Phew!” said Timothy.

He took off his hat and fanned himself. It was the first time he had ever run away from trouble, but now he had almost flown. Those favoured people who were in sight of Sir John Maxell’s handsome villa, saw the door swung open and a young man taking the front path in four strides and the gate in another before he sped like the wind along the street.

“Phew!” said Timothy again.

He went the longest way back to his hotel, to find that a telephone message had been received from Sir John. It was short and to the point.

“Please don’t come again.”

Timothy read the slip and chuckled.

“Is it likely?” he asked the page who brought the message.

Then he remembered the girl in grey, with the dark eyes, and he fingered his smooth chin thoughtfully.

“I wonder if it is worth while taking a chance,” he said to himself, and decided that, for the moment, it was not.

CHAPTER X

LADY MAXELL yawned and put down the magazine she was reading. She looked at her watch. It was ten o’clock. At such an hour Paris would be beginning to wake up. The best people would still be in the midst of their dinner, and Marie de Montdidier (born Hopkins) would be putting the final dabs of powder on her nose in her dressing-room at the Folies Bergères before making her first and her final appearance.

The boulevards would be bright with light, and there would be lines of twinkling autos in the Bois for the late diners at the Aromonville. She looked across at the girl sitting under a big lamp in a window recess, a book on her knees, but her mind and eyes elsewhere.

“Mary,” she said, and the girl, with a start, woke from her reverie.

“Do you want me, Lady Maxell?”

“What is the matter with Sir John? You know him better than I do.”

The girl shook her head.

“I hardly know, Lady Maxell——”

“For heaven’s sake don’t call me ‘Lady Maxell,’ ” said the other irritably. “I’ve told you to call me Sadie if you want to.” There was a silence. “Evidently you don’t want,” snapped the woman. “You’re what I call a fine, sociable family. You seem to get your manners from your new friend.”

The girl went red.

“My new friend?” she asked, and Lady Maxell turned her back to her with some resolution and resumed for a moment the reading of her magazine.

“I don’t mind if you find any pleasure in talking to that kind of insect,” she said, putting the periodical down again. “Why, the world’s full of those do-nothing boys. I suppose he knows there’s money coming to you.”

The girl smiled.

“Very little, Lady Maxell,” she said.

“A little’s a lot to a man like that,” said the other. “You mustn’t think I am prejudiced because I was—er—annoyed the other day. That is temperament.”

Again the girl smiled, but it was a different kind of smile, and Lady Maxell observed it.

“You can marry him as far as I am concerned,” she said. “These sneaking meetings are not exactly complimentary to Sir John, that’s all.”

The girl closed her book, walked across to the shelf and put it away before she spoke.

“I suppose you’re speaking of Mr. Anderson,” she said. “Yes, I have met him, but there has been nothing furtive in the meetings. He stopped me in the park and apologised for having been responsible for the scene—for your temperament, you know.”

Lady Maxell looked up sharply, but the girl met her eyes without wavering.

“I hope you aren’t trying to be sarcastic,” complained the older woman. “One never knows how deep you are. But I can tell you this, that sarcasm is wasted on me.”

“I’m sure of that,” said the girl.

Lady Maxell looked again, but apparently the girl was innocent of offensive design.

“I say I met Mr. Anderson. He was very polite and very nice. Then I met him again—in fact, I have met him several times,” she said thoughtfully. “So far from his being a do-nothing, Lady Maxell, I think you are doing him an injustice. He is working at the Parade Drug Store.”

“He will make a fine match for you,” said the woman. “Sir John will just love having a shop-walker in the family!”

That ended the conversation for both of them, and they sat reading for a quarter of an hour before Lady Maxell threw her magazine on the floor and got up.

“Sir John had a telegram yesterday that worried him,” she said. “Do you know what it was about?”

“Honestly I do not know, Lady Maxell,” said the girl. “Why don’t you ask him yourself?”

“Because he would tell me a lie,” said the woman coolly, and the girl winced.

“He brought all his money and securities from the Dawlish and County Bank to-day and put them in his safe and he had the chief constable with him for half an hour this morning.”

This was news to the girl, and she was interested in spite of herself.

“Now, Mary,” said Lady Maxell, “I’m going to be frank with you—frankness pays sometimes. They called my marriage a romance of the screen. Every newspaper said as much and I suppose that is true. But the most romantic part of the marriage was my estate in Honolulu, my big house in Paris and my bank balance. Ellsberger’s publicity man put all that stuff about, and I’ve an idea that Sir John was highly disappointed when he found he’d married me for myself alone. That’s how it strikes me.”

Here was a marriage which had shocked Society and had upset the smooth current of the girl’s life, placed in an entirely new light.

“Aren’t you very rich?” she asked slowly, and Sadie laughed.

“Rich! There was a tram fare between me and the workhouse the day I married Sir John,” she said. “I don’t blame him for being disappointed. Lots of these cinema stars are worth millions—I wasn’t one of them. I married because I thought I was going to have a good time—lots of money and plenty of travel—and I chose with my eyes shut.”

The girl was silent. For once Sadie Maxell’s complaint had justification. Sir John Maxell was not a spending man. He lived well, but never outside the circle of necessity.

The girl was about to speak, when there came a dramatic interruption.

There was a “whang!” a splintering of glass and something thudded against the wall. Lady Maxell stood up as white as death.

“What was that?” she gasped.

The girl was pale, but she did not lose her nerve.

“Somebody fired a shot. Look!”

She pulled aside the curtain. “The bullet went through the window.”

“Keep away from the window, you fool!” screamed the woman. “Turn out the light! Ring the bell!”

Mary moved across the room and turned the switch. They waited in silence, but no other shot was fired. Perhaps it was an accident. Somebody had been firing at a target. . . .

“Go and tell my husband!” said Sadie. “Quickly!”

The girl passed through the lighted hall upstairs and knocked at Sir John’s door. There was no answer. She tried the door, but found it locked. This was not unusual. He had a separate entrance to his study, communicating by a balcony and a flight of stairs with the garden. A wild fear seized her. Possibly Sir John had been in the garden when the shot was fired; it may have been intended for him. She knocked again louder, and this time she heard his step and the door was opened.

“Did you knock before?” he asked. “I was writing——”

Then he saw her face.

“What has happened?” he demanded.

The girl told him, and he made his way downstairs slowly, as was his wont. He entered the drawing-room, switched on the lights, and without a glance at his wife walked to the window and examined the shattered pane.

“I imagined I heard a noise, but thought somebody had dropped something. When did this happen? Just before you came up?”

The girl nodded.

Maxell looked from one to the other. His wife was almost speechless with terror, and Mary Maxell alone was calm.

“It has come already,” he said musingly. “I did not think that this would happen so soon.”

He walked down to the hall where the telephone hung and rang through to the police station, and the girl heard all he said.

“Yes, it is Sir John Maxell speaking. A shot has just been fired through my window. No, not at me—I was in my study. Apparently a rifle shot. Yes, I was right——”