Phipps for once looked a little taken aback.

"My dear sir," he protested, "your trans-Atlantic bluntness is somewhat disconcerting. However, you must admit that we have heard you patiently. Let us now, if you are willing, discuss for a minute or two the real object of your visit."

"I have delivered my warning," Wingate remarked. "I am only sorry that you will not take me more seriously. I am now at your service."

"In plain words, then, I want to purchase your holding in the Universal Steamship Company, a holding amounting, I believe, to one million, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars."

Wingate effectually concealed a genuine surprise.

"You seem remarkably well informed as to my investments," he observed.

"Not as to your investments generally," Phipps replied, "but as to your holding of Universal stock. In this stock it is my desire to secure a controlling interest."

"Why?"

Phipps hesitated for a moment. Then he replied with much apparent frankness.

"I could invent a dozen reasons. I prefer to tell you the truth and to base my offer upon existing conditions."

"The truth will be very interesting," Wingate murmured, with a note of faint sarcasm in his tone.

"Here are my cards, then, laid upon the table," Phipps continued, rapping the place in front of him with the back of his hand. "An Asiatic Power has offered me an immense commission if I can arrange the sale to them of the Atlantic fleet of the Universal Line."

"For what purpose?"

"Trading purposes between Japan and China," Phipps explained. "The quickest way of bringing about the sale and earning my commission is for me to acquire a controlling interest in the company. I have already a certain number of shares. The possession of yours will give me control. The shares to-day stand at a dollar and an eighth. That would make your holding, Mr. Wingate, worth, say, one million, four hundred thousand dollars. I am going to offer you a premium on the top of that, say one million, six hundred thousand dollars at today's rate of exchange."

"For trading purposes between Japan and China," Wingate reflected.

"That is the scheme," Phipps assented.

Wingate indulged in a few moments' reflection. He had no particular interest in the Universal Steamship Company—a company trading between San Francisco and Japan—and from all that he could remember of their position and prospects, the price was a generous one. Nevertheless, he was conscious of a curious disinclination to part with his shares. The very fact that he knew he was being watched with a certain amount of anxiety stiffened his impulse to retain them.

"A very fair offer, Mr. Phipps, I have no doubt," he said at last. "On the other hand, I am not a seller."

"Not a seller? Not at a quarter premium?"

"Nor a half," Wingate replied, "nor, as a matter of fact, a hundred per cent. premium. You see, I don't trust you, Phipps. You may have told me the truth. You may not. I shall hold my shares for the present."

"Mr. Wingate," Phipps exclaimed incredulously, "you astonish me!"

"Very likely," was the unconcerned reply. "I won't say that I may not change my mind a little later on, if you are still a buyer. Before I did anything, however, I should have a few enquiries to make. If this concludes our business, Mr. Phipps—"

Dredlinton waved a nervous hand towards him.

"One moment, please," he begged, "I have just a few words to say to Mr. Wingate."

The latter glanced at the clock.

"I hope you will say them as quickly as possible," he enjoined. "I have a busy morning."

Dredlinton leaned over Phipps' chair. There was a sinister meaning in his hoarse whisper.

"Leave me alone with him for a moment," he suggested. "Perhaps I may be able to earn that two thousand pounds."

Phipps rose at once from his chair and made his way towards the door.

"Lord Dredlinton wishes to have a word with you, Mr. Wingate," he said. "I shall be on the premises, in case by any fortunate chance you should decide to change your mind."



CHAPTER XV

Dredlinton sank into Phipps' vacated chair and leaned back with his hands in his trousers pockets. He had the air of a man fortified by a certain amount of bravado,—stimulated by some evil purpose.

"So you don't want to sell those shares, Mr. Wingate?"

"I have decided not to," was the calm reply.

"Any particular reason?"

"None," Wingate acknowledged, "except that I am not very anxious to have any business relations with Mr. Phipps."

"And for the sake of that prejudice," Dredlinton observed, "you can afford to refuse such a profit as he offered you?"

"I have other reasons for not wishing to sell," Wingate declared. "I have a very high opinion of Mr. Phipps' judgment as a business man. If the shares are worth so much as that to him, they are probably worth the same amount for me to keep."

Lord Dredlinton shook his head.

"Quite a fallacy, Wingate," he pronounced. "Phipps, as a matter of fact, is offering you considerably more than the shares are worth, because with their help he means to bring off a big thing."

"If he relies upon my shares," was the indifferent reply, "I am afraid the big thing won't come off."

"You won't sell, then?"

"No!"

Lord Dredlinton glanced for a moment at his finger nails. He seemed wrapped in abstract thought.

"I wonder if I could induce you to change your mind," he said.

"I am quite sure that you could not."

"Still, I am going to try. You are a great admirer of my wife, I believe, Mr. Wingate?"

Wingate frowned slightly.

"I prefer not to discuss Lady Dredlinton with you," he said curtly.

"Still, you won't mind going so far as to say that you are an admirer of hers?" the latter persisted.

"Well?"

"You are probably her confidant in the unfortunate differences which have arisen between us?"

"If I were, I should not consider it my business to inform you."

"Your sympathy is without doubt on her side?"

Wingate changed his attitude.

"Look here," he said, "this subject is not of my choosing. I should have preferred to avoid it. Since you press me, however, I haven't the faintest hesitation in saying that I look upon your wife as one of the sweetest and best women I ever knew, married, unfortunately, to a person utterly unworthy of her."

Dredlinton started in his place. A little streak of colour flushed up to his eyes.

"What the devil do you mean by that?"

"Look here," Wingate expostulated, "you can't threaten me, Dredlinton. You asked for what you got. Why not save time and explain why you have dragged your wife's name into this business?"

Dredlinton, in his peculiar way, was angry. His speech was a little broken, his eyes glittered.

"Explain? My God, I will! You are one of those damned frauds, Wingate, who pose as a purist and don't hesitate to make capital out of the harmless differences which sometimes arise between husband and wife. You sympathise with Lady Dredlinton, eh?"

"I should sympathise with any woman who was your wife," Wingate assured him, his own temper rising.

Dredlinton leaned a little forward. He spoke with a vicious distinctness.

"You sympathise with her to such an extent that you lure her to your rooms at midnight and send her back when you've—"

Dredlinton's courage oozed out before he had finished his speech. Wingate had swung around towards his companion, and there was something terrifying in his attitude.

"You scoundrel!" he exclaimed.

Dredlinton drew a little farther back and kept his finger upon the bell.

"Look here," he said viciously, "you may as well drop those heroics. I am not talking at random. My wife was seen in your arms, in your rooms at the Milan Court, with her dressing case on the table, last night, by little Flossie Lane, your latest conquest in the musical comedy world. She spent the night at the Milan."

"It's a lie!" Wingate declared, with cold fury. "How the devil could Flossie Lane see anything of the sort? She was nowhere near my rooms."

"Oh, yes, she was!" Dredlinton assured him. "She just looked in—one look was quite enough. Didn't you hear the door slam?"

"My God!" Wingate muttered, with a sudden instinct of recollection.

"Perhaps you wonder why she came?" the other continued. "I will tell you. I followed my wife to the Milan—I thought it might be worth while. I saw her enter the lift and come up to your room. While I was hesitating as to what to do, I met Flossie. Devilish clever idea of mine! I determined to kill two birds with one stone. I told her you'd been enquiring for her—that you were alone in your rooms and would like to see her. She went up like a two-year-old. Jove, you ought to have seen her face when she came down!"

"You cad!" Wingate exclaimed. "Your wife simply came to beg my intervention with the management to secure her a room in the—"

"Chuck it!" Dredlinton interrupted. "You're a man of the world. You know very well that I can get a divorce, and I'm going to have it—if I want it. I am meeting Flossie Lane at midday at my solicitor's. What have you got to say about that?"

"That if you keep your word it will be a very happy release for your wife," Wingate replied drily.

Dredlinton leaned across the desk. There was an almost satyrlike grin upon his face.

"You are a fool," he said. "My wife wants to get rid of me—you and she have talked that over, I have no doubt—but not this way. She is a proud woman, Wingate. The one desire of her life is to be free, but you can take this from me—if I bring my suit and gain my decree on the evidence I shall put before the court—-don't forget Flossie Lane, will you?—she'll never raise her head again. That is what I am going to do, unless—"

He paused.

"Unless what?" Wingate demanded.

"Unless you sell those shares to Peter Phipps."

Wingate was silent for a few moments. He studied his companion appraisingly.

"Dredlinton," he said at last, "I did you an injustice."

"I am glad that you are beginning to appreciate the fact," the other replied, with some dignity. "I welcome your confession."

"I looked upon you," Wingate continued, "as only an ordinary, weak sort of scoundrel. I find you one of the filthiest blackguards who ever crawled upon the earth."

Dredlinton scowled for a moment and then laughed in a hard, unnatural sort of way.

"I can't lose my temper with you, Wingate—upon my word, I can't. You are so delightfully crude and refreshing. Your style, however, is a little more suited to your own country, don't you think—the Far West and that sort of thing. Shall I draft a little agreement that you will sell the shares to Phipps? Just a line or two will be sufficient."

Wingate made no reply. He walked across to the frosted window and gazed out of the upper panes up to the sky. Presently he returned.

"Where is your wife?" he asked.

"She telephoned from the Milan this morning, discovered that the young lady to whom she had such unfounded objections had left, and returned in a taxi just before I started for the office."

"Supposing I sell these shares?"

"Then," Dredlinton promised, "I shall endeavour to forget the incident of last night. Further than that, I might indeed be tempted, if it were made worth my while, to provide my wife with a more honourable mode of escape."

"You're wonderful," Wingate declared, nodding his head quickly. "What are you going to get for blackmailing me into selling those shares?"

"Two thousand pounds."

"Get along and earn it, then."

Dredlinton wrote in silence for several moments. Then he read the document over to himself.

"'I, John Wingate—all my shares in the Universal Steamship Company, and accept herewith as a deposit.' There, Mr. Wingate, I think you will find that correct. Phipps shall write you a cheque Immediately."

He touched the bell. Phipps entered almost at the same moment.

"I am pleased to tell you," Dredlinton announced, "that I have induced Mr. Wingate to see reason. He will sell the shares."

"My congratulations!" Phipps ventured, with a broad smile. "Mr. Wingate has made a most wise and acceptable decision."

"Will you make out a cheque for ten thousand pounds as a deposit?" Dredlinton continued. "Mr. Wingate will then sign the agreement I have drawn up on the lines of the memorandum you left on the desk."

"With pleasure," was the brisk reply.

Wingate took up a pen, glanced through the agreement, and was on the point of signing his name when a startled exclamation from the man by his side caused him to glance up. The door had been opened. Harrison was standing there, looking a little worried. His tone was almost apologetic.

"The Countess of Dredlinton," he announced.

The arrival of Josephine affected very differently the three men, to whom her coming was equally surprising. Her husband, after an exclamation which savoured of profanity, stared at her with a doubtful and malicious frown upon his forehead. With Wingate she exchanged one swift glance of mutual understanding. Phipps, after his first start of surprise, welcomed her with the utmost respect and cordiality.

"My dear Lady Dredlinton," he declared, "this is charming of you! I had really given up hoping that you would ever honour us with your presence."

"You can chuck all that, Phipps," Dredlinton interrupted curtly. "My wife hasn't come here to bandy civilities. What do you want, madam?" he demanded, moving a step nearer to her.

She held a slip of paper in her hand and unfolded it before their eyes.

"My husband," she said, "has justly surmised that I have not come here in any spirit of friendliness, I have come to let Mr. Wingate know the contents of this cable, which arrived soon after my husband left the house this morning. The message was in code, but, as Mr. Wingate's name appeared, I have taken the trouble to transcribe it."

"That's more than you could do, my lady," Dredlinton snarled.

"I can assure you that you are mistaken," was the calm reply. "You forget that you were not quite yourself last night, and that you left the B. & I. code book on the study table. Please listen, Mr. Wingate."

All the apparent good humour had faded from Phipps' face. He struck the table with his fist.

"Dredlinton," he insisted, "you must use your authority. That message is a private one. It must not be read."

Wingate moved to Josephine's side.

"Must not?" he repeated under his breath.

"It is a private message from a correspondent in New York, who is a personal friend of Lord Dredlinton's," Phipps declared. "It is of no concern to any one except ourselves. Dredlinton, you must make your wife understand—"

"Understand?" Dredlinton broke in. "Give me that message, madam."

He snatched at it. Wingate leaned over and swung him on one side. For a single moment Phipps, too, seemed about to attempt force. Then, with an ugly little laugh, he recovered himself.

"My dear Lady Dredlinton, let me reason with you," he begged. "On this occasion Mr. Wingate is in opposition to our interests, your husband's and mine. You cannot—"

"Let Lady Dredlinton read the cable," Wingate interposed.

It was done before any further interference was possible. Wingate stood at her side, grim and threatening. The words had left her lips before either of the other men could shout her down.

"It is a night message from New York," she said. "Listen: 'Confirm eleven steamers Universal Line withdrawn Japan trade loading secretly huge wheat cargo for Liverpool. Confirm John Wingate, Milan Court, holds controlling influence. Advise buy his shares any price.'"

There was a moment's intense silence. Dredlinton opened his lips and closed them again. Phipps was exhibiting remarkable self-control. His tone, as he addressed Wingate, was grave but almost natural.

"Under these circumstances, do you wish to repudiate your bargain?" he asked. "We must at least know where we are."

Wingate turned to Josephine.

"The matter," he decided, "is not in my hands. Lady Dredlinton," he went on, "the person who opened the door of my sitting room last night was Miss Flossie Lane, a musical comedy actress sent there by your husband, who had followed you to the Milan. Your husband imagines that because you were in my apartments at such an unusual hour, he has cause for a divorce. That I do not believe, but, to save proceedings which might be distasteful to you, I was prepared to sell Mr. Phipps my shares in the Universal Line, imagining it to be an ordinary business transaction. The cable which you have just read has revealed the true reason why Phipps desires to acquire those shares. The arrival of that wheat will force down prices, for a time, at any rate. It may even drive this accursed company into seeking some other field of speculation. What shall I do?"

She smiled at him over her husband's head. She did not hesitate even for a second. Her tone was proud and insistent.

"You must of course keep your shares," she declared. "As regards the other matter, my husband can do as he thinks well."

Wingate's eyes flashed his thanks. He drew a little sigh of relief and deliberately tore in halves the agreement which he had been holding. Dredlinton leaned over the desk, snatched at the telephone receiver, threw himself into his chair, and, glared first at Wingate and then at his wife.

"My God, then," he exclaimed furiously, "I'll keep my word!—Mayfair 67.—I'll drag you through the dust, my lady," he went on. "You shall be the heroine of one of those squalid divorce cases you've spoken of so scornfully. You shall crawl through life a divorcee, made an honest woman through the generosity of an American adventurer!—67, Mayfair, I said."

Phipps shook his head sorrowfully.

"My friend," he said, "this is useless bluster. Put down the telephone. Let us talk the matter out squarely. Your methods are a little too melodramatic."

"Go to hell!" Dredlinton shouted. "You are too much out for compromises, Phipps. There are times when one must strike.—Exchange! I say, Exchange! Why the devil can't you give me Mayfair 67?—What's that?—An urgent call?—Well, go on, then. Out with it.—Who's speaking? Mr. Stanley Rees' servant?—Yes, yes! I'm Lord Dredlinton. Get on with it."

There was a moment of intense silence. Dredlinton was listening, indifferently at first, then as though spellbound, his lips a little parted, his cheeks colourless, his eyes filled with a strange terror. Presently he laid down the receiver, although he failed to replace it. He turned very slowly around, and his eyes, still filled with a haunting fear, sought Wingate's.

"Stanley has disappeared!" he gasped. "He had one of those letters last night. It lies on his table now, his servant says. There was a noise in his room at four o'clock this morning. When they called him—-he had gone! No one has seen or heard of him since!"

"Stanley disappeared?" Phipps repeated in a dazed tone.

"There's been foul play!" Dredlinton cried hoarsely. "His servant is sure of it!"

Wingate picked up his hat and stick and moved towards the door. From the threshold he looked back, waiting whilst Josephine joined him.

"Youth," he said calmly, "must be served. Stanley Rees was, I believe, the youngest director on the Board of the British and Imperial Granaries. Now, if you like, Mr. Phipps, I'll come on to your market. I'm a seller of a hundred thousand bushels of wheat at to-day's price."

"Go to hell!" Phipps shouted, his face black with rage.



CHAPTER XVI

Roger Kendrick was in and disengaged when Wingate called upon him, a few minutes later. He welcomed his visitor cordially.

"That was a pretty good list you gave me the other day, Wingate," he remarked, "You've made money. You're making it still."

"Good!" Wingate commented, with a nod of satisfaction. "I dare say I shall need it all. Close up everything, Kendrick."

"The devil! One or two of your things are going strong, you know."

"Take profits and close up," Wingate directed. "I've another commission for you."

"One moment, then."

Kendrick hurried into the outer office and gave some brief instructions. His client picked up the tape and studied it until his return.

"How are things in the House?" Wingate enquired, as he resumed his seat.

"Uneasy," Kendrick replied. "B. & I.'s are the chief feature. They show signs of weakness, owing to the questions in the House of Commons last night."

"I'm a bear on B. & I.'s," Wingate declared. "What are they to-day?"

"They opened at five and a quarter. Half-an-hour ago they were being offered at five and an eighth."

"Very well," Wingate replied, "sell."

"How many?"

"No limit. Simply sell."

The broker was a little startled.

"Do you know anything?" he asked.

"Nothing definite. I've been studying their methods for some time. What they've been trying to do practically is to corner wheat. No one has ever succeeded in doing it yet. I don't think they will. My belief is that they are coming to the end of their tether, and there is still a large shipment of wheat which will be afloat next week."

Kendrick answered an enquiry through the telephone and leaned back in his chair.

"Wingate," he said, "I'm not sure that I actually agree with you about the B. & I. They have a wonderful system of subsidiary companies, and their holdings of wheat throughout the country are enormous,—all bought, mind you, at much below to-day's price. If they were to realise to-day, they'd realise an enormous profit. Personally, it seems to me that they've made their money and they can realise practically when they like. The price of wheat can't slump sufficiently to put them in Queer Street."

"The price of wheat is coming down, though, and coming down within the next ten days," Wingate pronounced.

Kendrick stretched out his hand towards the cigarettes and passed the box across to his friend.

"Why do you think so?" he asked bluntly. "According to accounts, the harvests all over the world are disastrous. There is less wheat being shipped here than ever before in the world's history. I can conceive that we may have reached the top, and that the price may decline a few points from now onwards, but even that would make very little difference. I can't see the slightest chance of any material fall in wheat."

"I can," Wingate replied. "Don't worry, Ken. No need to dash into the business like a Chicago booster. Just go at it quietly but unwaveringly. I suppose a good many of the B. & I. commissions are still open, and there's bound to be a little buying elsewhere, but I'm a seller of wheat, too, wherever there's any business doing. Wheat's coming down; so are the B. & I. shares. I'm not giving you verbal orders. Here's your warrant."

He drew a sheet of note paper towards him and wrote a few lines upon it. Kendrick blotted and laid a paper weight upon it.

"That's one of the biggest things I've ever taken on for a client, Wingate," he said. "You won't mind if I venture upon one last word?"

"Not I," was the cheerful reply. "Go right ahead."

"You're sure that Phipps hasn't drawn you into this? He's a perfect devil for cunning, that man, and he's simply been waiting for your coming. I think it was the disappointment of his life when you first came down to the City and left him alone. You've shown wonderful restraint, old chap. You're sure you haven't been goaded into this?"

Wingate smiled.

"Don't you worry about me, Ken," he begged. "Of course, in a manner of speaking, this is a duel between Phipps and myself, and if you were to ask my advice which to back, I don't know that I should care to take the responsibility of giving it. At the same time, I'm out to break Phipps and I rather think this time I'm going to do it.—Come along to the Milan, later on, and lunch. Lady Amesbury and Sarah Baldwin and a few others are coming."

"Lady Dredlinton, by any chance?" Kendrick asked.

"Lady Dredlinton, certainly."

"I'll turn up soon after one. And, Wingate."

"Well?"

"Don't think I'm a croaker, but I know Peter Phipps. There isn't a man on this earth I'd fear more as an enemy. He's unscrupulous, untrustworthy, and an unflinching hater. You and he are hard up against one another, I know, and I suppose you realise that your growing friendship with Josephine Dredlinton is simply hell for him."

"I imagine you know that his attentions to her have been entirely unwelcome," Wingate said calmly.

"I will answer for it that she has never encouraged him for a moment," Kendrick assented, "yet Phipps is one of those men who never take 'no' for an answer, who simply don't know what it is to despair of a thing. I've been watching that menage for the last twelve months, and I've watched Peter Phipps fighting his grim battle. I think I was one of the party when he first met her. Since then, though the fellow has any amount of tact, his pursuit of her must have been a persecution. He put Dredlinton on the Board of the B. & I., solely to buy his way into the household. He sent him home one day in a new car—a present to his wife. She has never ridden in it and she made her husband return it."

"I know," Wingate muttered. "I've heard a little of this, and seen it, too."

"Well, there you are," Kendrick concluded. "You know Phipps. You know what it must seem like to him to have another man step in, just as he may have been flattering himself that he was gaining ground. He hated you before. He'd give his soul, if he had one to break you now."

"He'll do what he can, Ken," said Wingate, with a smile, as he left the office, "but you may take it that the odds are a trifle on us.—Not later than one-thirty, then."

"There is no doubt," he remarked a moment later, as he stepped into his car, where Josephine was waiting for him, "that we are at war."

She laughed quietly. The excitement of those last few minutes in the offices of the British and Imperial Granaries had acted like a stimulant. She had lost entirely her tense and depressed air. The colour of her eyes was newly discovered in the light that played there.

"You couldn't have fired the first shot in more dramatic fashion," she declared. "Even Mr. Phipps lost his nerve for a moment, and I thought that Henry was going to collapse altogether. I wonder what they are doing now."

"Ringing up Scotland Yard, or on their way there, I should think," Wingate replied.

She shivered for a moment.

"You are not afraid of the police, are you?" she asked.

"I don't think we need be," he replied cheerfully, "unless we have bad luck. Of course, I have had professional advice as to all the details. The thing has been thought out step by step, almost scientifically. Slate is a marvellous fellow, and I think he has gathered up every loose end. Makes one realise how easy crime would be if one went into it unflurried and with a clear conscience.—Tell me, by the by, was it by accident that you opened that cable this morning?"

"Not entirely," she confessed. "I was in the library this morning talking to Grant, my new butler."

"Satisfactory, I trust?" Wingate murmured.

"A paragon," she replied, with a little gleam in her eyes. "Well, on Henry's desk was the rough draft of a cable, torn into pieces, and on one of them, larger than the rest, I couldn't help seeing your name. It looked as though Henry had been sending a cable in which you were somehow concerned. While I was there, the reply came, so I decided to open and decode it. Directly I realised what it was about, I brought it straight to the office, hoping to catch you there."

"You are a most amazing woman," he declared.

She leaned a little towards him.

"And you are a most likable man," she murmured.

Wingate's luncheon party had been arranged for some days, and was being given, in fact, at the suggestion of Lady Amesbury herself.

"I am a perfectly shameless person," she declared, as she took her seat by Wingate's side at the round table in the middle of the restaurant. "I invited myself to this party. I always do. The last three times our dear host has been over to England, as soon as I have enquired after his health and his business, and whether the right woman has turned up yet, I ask him when he's going to take me to lunch at the Milan. I do love lunching in a restaurant," she confided to Kendrick, who sat at her other side, "and nearly all my friends prefer their stodgy dining rooms."

"Have you heard the news, aunt?" Sarah asked across the table.

"About that silly little Mrs. Liddiard Green, do you mean, and Jack Fulton? I hear they were seen in Paris together last week."

"Pooh! Who cares about Mrs. Liddiard Green!" Sarah scoffed. "I mean the news about Jimmy. The dear boy's gone into the City."

"God bless my soul!" Lady Amesbury exclaimed. "How much has he got to lose?"

"He isn't going to lose anything," Sarah replied. "Mr. Maurice White has taken him into his office, and he's going to have a commission on the business he does. This is his first morning. He must be busy or he'd have been here before now. Jimmy's never late for meals."

"Hm!" Lady Amesbury grunted. "I expect he has to stay and mind the office while Mr. White gets his lunch."

"Considering," Sarah rejoined with dignity, "that there are seventeen other clerks, besides office boys and typists, and Jimmy has a room to himself, that doesn't seem likely. I expect he's doing a big deal for somebody or other."

"Thank God it isn't me!" her aunt declared. "I love Jimmy—every one does—but he wasn't born for business."

"We shall see," Sarah observed. "My own opinion of Jimmy is that his mental gifts are generally underrated."

"You're not prejudiced, by any chance, are you?" Kendrick asked, smiling.

"That is my dispassionate opinion," Sarah pronounced, "and I don't want any peevish remarks from you, Roger Kendrick. You're jealous because you let Mr. White get in ahead of you and secure Jimmy. It was only three days ago that we agreed he should go into the City. He was perfectly sweet about it, too. He was playing for the M.C.C. to-morrow, and polo at Ranelagh on Saturday."

"Is he giving them both up?" Kendrick enquired.

"He's giving up the cricket, of course, unless he finds that it happens to be a slack day in the City," Sarah replied. "As for the polo, well, no one works on Saturday afternoon, do they?"

"How is my friend, Mr. Peter Phipps?" Lady Amesbury demanded. "The big man who looked like a professional millionaire? Is he making a man of that bad husband of yours, Josephine?"

"They spend a good deal of time together," Josephine replied. "I don't think he'll ever succeed in making a business man out of Henry, though, any more than Mr. White will out of Jimmy."

A familiar form approached the table. Sarah welcomed him with a wave of her hand. The Honourable Jimmy greeted Lady Amesbury and his host, nodded to every one else, and took the vacant place which had been left for him. He seemed fatigued.

"Can I have a cocktail, Mr. Wingate?" he begged, summoning a waiter. "A double Martini, please. Big things doing in the City," he confided.

"Have you had to work very hard, dear?" Sarah asked sympathetically.

"Absolutely feverish rush ever since I got there," he declared. "Don't know how long my nerves will stand it. Telephones ringing, men rushing out of the office without their hats, and bumping into you without saying 'by your leave' or 'beg your pardon,' or any little civility of that sort, and good old Maurice, with his hair standing up on end, shouting into two telephones at the same time, and dictating a letter to one of the peachiest little bits of fluff I've seen outside the front rows for I don't know how long."

"Jimmy," Sarah said sternly, "I'm not sure that the City is going to suit you. You don't have to dictate letters to her, do you?"

"No such luck," Jimmy sighed. "She is the Chief's own particular property. Does a thousand words a minute and knits a jumper at the same time."

"Whom do you dictate your letters to?" Sarah demanded.

"To tell you the truth," Jimmy answered, falling on his cocktail, "I haven't had any to write yet."

"What has your work been?" Lady Amesbury asked.

"Kind of superintending," the young man explained, "looking on at everything—getting the hang of it, you know."

"Are the other men there nice?" Sarah enquired.

"Well, we don't seem to have had much time for conversation yet," Jimmy replied, attacking his caviar like a man anxious to make up for lost time. "I heard one chap tell another that I'd come to give tone to the establishment, which seemed to me a pleasant and friendly way of looking at it."

"You didn't have any commissions yourself?" Sarah went on.

"Well, not exactly," Jimmy confessed. "About half an hour before I left, a lunatic with perspiration streaming down his face, and no hat, threw himself into my room. 'I'll buy B. & I.'s,' he shouted. 'I'll buy B. & I.'s!'"

"What did you do?" Wingate enquired with interest.

"I told him I hadn't got any," was the injured reply. "He went cut like a streak of damp lightning. I heard him kicking up an awful hullaballoo in the next office."

"Jimmy," Sarah said reproachfully, "that might have been your first client. You ought to have made a business of finding him some B. & I.'s."

"There might have been some in a drawer or somewhere," Lady Amesbury suggested.

"Distinct lack of enterprise," Kendrick put in. "You should have thrown yourself on the telephone and asked me if I'd got a few."

"Never thought of it," Jimmy confessed. "Live and learn. First day and all that sort of thing, you know. I tell you what," he went on, "all the excitement and that gives you an appetite for your food."

The manager of the restaurant, on his way through the room, recognised Wingate and came to pay his respects.

"Did you hear about the little trouble over in the Court, Mr. Wingate?" he enquired.

"No, I haven't heard anything," Wingate replied.

They all leaned a little forward. The manager included them in his confidence.

"The young gentleman you probably know, Mr. Wingate," he said,—"has the suite just underneath yours—Mr. Stanley Rees, his name is—disappeared last night."

"Disappeared?" Lady Amesbury repeated.

"Stanley Rees?" Kendrick exclaimed.

The manager nodded.

"A very pleasant young gentleman," he continued, "wealthy, too. He is a nephew of Mr. Peter Phipps, Chairman of the Directors of the British and Imperial Granaries. It seems he dressed for dinner, came down to the bar to have a cocktail, leaving his coat and hat and scarf up in his room, and telling his valet that he would return for them in ten minutes. He hasn't been seen or heard of since."

"Sounds like the 'Arabian Nights,'" Jimmy declared. "Probably found he was a bit late for his grub and went on without his coat and hat."

"What about not coming back all night, sir?" the manager asked.

"Lads will be lads," Jimmy answered sententiously.

The manager showed an entire lack of sympathy with his attitude.

"Mr. Stanley Rees," he said, "is a remarkably well-conducted, quiet young gentleman, very popular here amongst the domestics, and noted for keeping very early hours. He was engaged to dine out at Hampstead with some friends, who telephoned for him several times during the evening. He was also supping here with a gentleman who arrived and waited an hour for him."

"Was he in good health?" Wingate enquired casually.

"Excellent, I should say, sir," the manager replied. "He was a young gentleman who took remarkably good care of himself."

"I know the sort," Jimmy said complacently, watching his glass being filled. "A whisky and soda when the doctor orders it, and ginger ale with his luncheon."

The manager was called away. Kendrick had become thoughtful.

"Queer thing," he remarked, "that young Rees should have disappeared just as the B. & I. have become a feature on 'Change. He was Phipps' right-hand man in financial matters."

"Disappearances in London seem a little out of date," Wingate remarked, as he scrutinised the dish which the maitre d'hotel had brought for his inspection. "The missing person generally turns up and curses the scaremongers.—Lady Amesbury, this Maryland chicken is one of our favourite New York dishes. Kendrick, have some more wine. Wilshaw, your appetite has soon flagged."

"All the same," Kendrick mused, "it's a dashed queer thing about Stanley Rees."

After his guests had departed, Wingate had a few minutes alone with Josephine.

"I hate letting you go back to that house," he admitted.

She laughed softly.

"Why, my dear," she said, "think how necessary it is. For the first time, in my life I am absolutely looking forward to it. I never thought that I should live to associate romance with that ugly, brown-stone building."

"If there's the slightest hitch, you'll let me hear, won't you?" he begged. "The telephone is on to my room, and anything that happens unforeseen—remember this, Josephine—is a complete surprise to you. Everything is arranged so that you are not implicated in any way."

"Pooh!" she scoffed. "Nothing will happen. You are invincible, John. You will conquer with these men as you have with poor me."

"You have no regrets?" he asked, as they moved through the hall on the way out.

"I regret nothing," she answered fervently. "I never shall."



CHAPTER XVII

Wingate, after several strenuous hours spent in Slate's office, returned to his rooms late that night, to find Peter Phipps awaiting him. There was something vaguely threatening about the bulky figure of the man standing gloomily upon the hearth rug, all the spurious good nature gone from his face, his brows knitted, his cheeks hanging a little and unusually pale. Wingate paused on the threshold of the room and his hand crept into his pocket. Phipps seemed to notice the gesture and shook his head.

"Nothing quite so crude, Wingate," he said. "I know an enemy when I see one, but I wasn't thinking of getting rid of you that way."

"I have found it necessary," Wingate remarked slowly, "to be prepared for all sorts of tricks when I am up against anybody as conscienceless as you. I don't want you here, Phipps. I didn't ask you to come and see me. I've nothing to discuss with you."

"There are times," Phipps replied, "when the issue which cannot be fought out to the end with arms can be joined in the council chamber. I have come to know your terms."

Wingate shook his head.

"I don't understand. It is too soon for this sort of thing. You are not beaten yet."

"I am tired," his visitor muttered. "May I sit down?"

"You are an unwelcome guest," Wingate replied coldly, "but sit if you will. Then say what you have to say and go."

Phipps sank into an easy-chair. It was obvious that he was telling the truth so far as regarded his fatigue. He seemed to have aged ten years.

"I have been down below in Stanley's rooms," he explained, "been through his papers. It's true what the inspector fellow reports. There isn't a scrap of evidence of any complication in his life. There isn't a shadow of doubt in my mind as to the cause of his disappearance."

"Indeed!" Wingate murmured.

"It's a villainous plot, engineered by you!" Phipps continued, his voice shaking. "I'm fond of the boy. That's why I've come to you. Name your terms."

Wingate indulged in a curious bout of silence. He took a pipe from a rack, filled it leisurely with tobacco, lit it and smoked for several moments. Then he turned towards his unwelcome companion.

"I am debarred by a promise made to myself," he said coldly, "from offering you any form of hospitality. If you wish to smoke, I shall not interfere."

Phipps shook his head.

"I have not smoked all the evening," he confessed, "I cannot. You are right when you say that we are not beaten, but I like to look ahead. I want to know your terms."

"You are anxious about your nephew?"

"Yes!"

"And why do you connect me with his disappearance?"

Phipps gave a little weary gesture.

"I am so sick of words," he said.

"We will argue the matter, then," conceded Wingate, "from your point of view. Supposing that your nephew has been abducted and is held at the present moment as a hostage. It would be, without doubt, by some person or persons who resented the brutality, the dishonesty, the foul commercial methods of the company with which he was connected. An amendment of those methods might produce his release."

"And that amendment?"

Wingate picked up a newspaper and glanced at it, pulled a heavy gold pencil from his chain and made a few calculations.

"Your operations in wheat," he said, "have brought the loaf which should cost the working man a matter of sevenpence up to two shillings. You seem to have dabbled in a good many other products, too, the price of which you have forced up into the clouds,—just those products which are necessary to the working man. But we will leave those alone, if you were to sell wheat at forty-five per cent less than to-day's price, I should think it extremely likely that Stanley Rees would be able to dine with you to-morrow night."

"You are talking like a madman," Phipps declared. "It would mean ruin."

"How sad!" Wingate murmured. "All the same, I do not think that you will see your nephew again until you have sold wheat."

"You admit that you are responsible, then?" Phipps growled.

"I admit nothing of the sort. I am simply speculating as to the possible cause of his disappearance. If I had anything to do with it, those would be my terms. To-morrow they might be the same; perhaps the next day. But," he went on, with a sudden almost fierce break in his voice, "the day after would probably be too late. There are a great many hungry people in the north. There are a great many who are starving. There is one in London who is beginning to feel the pangs."

"You are ill-treating him!" Phipps cried passionately. "I shall go to Scotland Yard myself! I shall tell them what you have said. I shall denounce you!"

"My dear fellow," Wingate scoffed, "you have done that already. You have induced those very excellent upholders of English law and liberty to set a plain-clothes man to following me about. I can assure you that he has had a very pleasant and a very busy evening."

Phipps rose to his feet.

"Wingate," he exclaimed, "curse you!"

"A very natural sentiment. I hope that you may repeat it a good many times before the end comes."

"You are a conspirator—a criminal!" Phipps continued, his voice shaking with excitement. "You are breaking the laws of the country. I shall see that you are in gaol before the week is out!"

"A good deal of what you say is true," Wingate admitted, "with the possible exception of the latter part. Believe me, Peter Phipps, you are a great deal more likely to see the inside of a prison than I am. You will be a poor man presently and poor men of your type are desperate."

Phipps remained perfectly silent for several moments.

"Wingate, you are a hard enemy," he said at last. "Will you treat?"

"I have named the price."

"You are a fool!" Phipps almost shouted. "Do you know," he went on, striking the table with his clenched fist, "that what you suggest would cost five million pounds?"

"You and your friends can stand it," was the unruffled reply. "If not, your brokers can share the loss."

"That means you make a bankrupt of me?" Phipps demanded hoarsely.

"Why not?" Wingate replied. "It's been a long duel between us, Phipps, and I mean this to be the final bout."

Phipps moved his position a little uneasily. He was keeping himself under control, but the veins were standing out upon his forehead, his frame seemed tense with passion.

"Tell me, Wingate, is it still the girl?"

Wingate looked across at him. His face and tone were alike relentless, his eyes shone like points of steel.

"You did ill to remind me of that, Phipps," he said. "However, I will answer your question. It is still the girl."

"She was nothing to you," Phipps muttered sullenly.

"One can't make your class of reptile understand these things," Wingate declared scornfully. "She came to me in New York with a letter from her father, my old tutor, who had died out in the Adirondacks without a shilling in the world. He sent the girl to me and asked me to put her in the way of earning her own living. It was a sacred charge, that, and I accepted it willingly. The only trouble was that I was leaving for Europe the next day. I put a thousand dollars in the bank for her, found her a comfortable home with respectable people, and then considered in what office I could place her during my absence. I had the misfortune to meet you that morning. Time was short. Every one knew that your office was conducted on sound business lines. I told you her story and you took her. I hadn't an idea that a man alive could be such a villain as you turned out to be."

"You'd be a fine fellow, Wingate," Phipps said, with a touch of his old cynicism, "if you weren't always sheering off towards the melodramatic. The girl wanted to see life, she attracted me, and I showed it to her. I'd have done the right thing by her if she hadn't behaved like an hysterical idiot."

"The girl's death lies at your door, and you know it," Wingate replied. "It has taken me a good many years to pay my debt to the dead. I did my best to kill you, but without a weapon you were a hard man to shake the last spark of life out of.—There, I am tired of this. I have let you talk. I have answered your useless questions. Be so good as to leave me."

The shadow of impending disaster seemed to have found its way into Phipps' bones. He seemed to have lost alike his courage and his dignity.

"Look here," he said, "the rest of the things which lie between us we can fight out, but I want my nephew. What will his return cost me in hard cash between you and me?"

"The cost of bringing wheat down to its normal figure," Wingate answered.

"I couldn't do it if I would," Phipps argued. "There's Skinflint Martin—he won't part with a bushel. I'm not alone in this. Come, I have my cheque book in my pocket. You can fight the B. & I. to the death, if you will—commercially, politically, anyhow—but I want my nephew."

Wingate threw open the door.

"There was a girl once," he reminded him, "my ward, who drowned herself. To hell with your nephew, Phipps!"

Passion for a moment made once more a man of Phipps. His eyes blazed.

"And to hell with you!—Hypocrite!—Adulterer!" he shouted.

Wingate's fist missed the point of his adversary's chin by less than a thought. Phipps went staggering back through the open door into the corridor and stood leaning against the wall, half dazed, his hand to his cheek. Wingate looked at him contemptuously for a moment, every nerve in his body aching for the fight. Then he remembered.

"Get home to your kennel, Phipps," he ordered.

Then he slammed the door and locked it.



CHAPTER XVIII

"Another strange face," Sarah remarked, looking after the butler who had just brought in the coffee. "I thought you were one of those women, Josephine, who always kept their servants."

"I do, as a rule," was the quiet reply, "only sometimes Henry intervenes. If there is one thing that the modern servant dislikes, it is sarcasm, and sarcasm is Henry's favourite weapon when he wants to be really disagreeable. Generally speaking, I think a servant would rather be sworn at."

"You seem to have made a clean sweep this time."

Josephine stirred her coffee thoughtfully.

"Henry has been having one of his bad weeks," she said. "He has been absolutely impossible to every one. He threatened to give every servant in the house notice, the other day, because his bell wasn't answered, so I took him at his word. We've no one left except the cook, and she declined to go. She has been with us ever since we were married. All the same, I wouldn't have had any one but you and Jimmy to dinner to-night. I wasn't at all sure how things would turn out. Besides, it isn't every one I'd care to ask into this dungeon of a room."

"I was wondering why we were here, Josephine," Sarah remarked, looking around her. "It used to be one of your hospital rooms, surely?"

Josephine nodded.

"The other rooms want turning out, dear. I knew you wouldn't mind."

There are women as well as men who have learnt the art of a sociable silence. Josephine and Sarah finished their cigarettes and their coffee in a condition of reflective ease. Then Sarah stood up and straightened her hair in front of the mirror.

"Josephine," she announced, "I am going to marry Jimmy."

"You have really made up your minds at last, then?" her hostess enquired, with interest.

"My dear," Sarah declared, "we've come to the conclusion that we can't afford to remain single any longer. We are both spending far too much money."

"I am sure I wish you luck," Josephine said earnestly. "I am very fond of Jimmy."

"He is rather a dear."

"I wonder how you'll like settling down. It will be a very different life for you."

"Of course," Sarah admitted with a sigh, "I hate giving up my profession, but there is a sort of monotony about it when Jimmy insists upon being my only fare."

"Is this the reason why Jimmy is making his great debut as a man of affairs?" Josephine asked.

"Not exactly," Sarah replied. "As a matter of fact, that was rather a bluff. His mother is so afraid of his starting in some business where they'll get him to put some money in, that she has agreed to allow him a couple of thousand a year until he comes in for his property, on condition that he clears out of the City altogether."

"That seems quite decent of her. Where are you going to live?"

"In the bailiff's cottage on the Longmere estate, which will come to Jimmy some day. Jimmy is going to take an interest in farming. So long as it isn't his own farm, his mother thinks that won't hurt."

Josephine laughed softly.

"A bright old lady, his mother, I should think."

"Well, she has had the good sense to realise at last that I am the only person likely to keep Jimmy out of mischief. He is such a booby sometimes, and yet, somehow or other, you know, Josephine, I've never wanted to marry anybody else. I don't understand why, but there it is."

"That's the right feeling, dear, so long as you're sure," Josephine declared cheerfully.

Sarah rose suddenly to her feet, crossed the little space between them, and crouched on the floor by her friend's chair.

"You've been such a brick to me, dear," she declared, looking up at her fondly, "and I feel a perfect beast being so happy all the time."

Josephine let her fingers rest on the strands of soft, wavy hair.

"Don't be absurd, Sarah," she remonstrated. "Besides, things haven't been quite so bad with me lately."

"You look different, somehow," her guest admitted, "as though you were taking a little more interest in life. I've seen quite a wonderful light in your eyes, now and then."

"Ridiculous!"

"It isn't ridiculous, and I'm delighted about it," Sarah went on. "You must know, dear, that I am not quite an idiot, and I am too fond of you not to notice any change."

"There is just one thing which does make a real change in a woman's life," Josephine declared, her voice trembling for a moment, "and that is when she finds that it really makes a difference to some one whether she's miserable or not."

Sarah nodded appreciatively.

"I know you think I am only a shallow, outrageous little flirt sometimes, Josephine," she said, "but I am not. I do know what you mean. Only I don't think you help yourself to as much happiness from that knowledge as you ought to, as you have a right to."

"What do you mean?" Josephine demanded half fearfully.

"Just what I say. I think he is simply splendid, and if any one cared for me as much as he does for you, I'd—"

She stopped short and looked towards the door. Jimmy was peering in, and behind him Lord Dredlinton.

"Eh? what's that, Sarah?" the former demanded. "You'd what?"

Sarah rose to her feet and resumed her place in her chair.

"I was trying to pull Josephine down from the clouds," she remarked.

Lord Dredlinton smiled across at her. There was an unpleasant significance in his tone, as he answered, "Oh, it can be done, my dear young lady." He paused and looked at her disagreeably, "but I am not sure that you are the right person to do it."

The shadow had fallen once more upon Josephine's face. She had become cold and indifferent. She ignored her husband's words. Lord Dredlinton was looking around him in disgust.

"What on earth are we in this mausoleum for?" he demanded.

"Domestic reasons," Josephine answered, with her finger upon the bell. "Have you men had your coffee?"

"We had it in the dining room," Jimmy assured her.

"I can't think why you hurried so," Sarah grumbled. "How dared you only stay away a quarter of an hour, Jimmy! You know I love to have a gossip with Josephine."

"Couldn't stick being parted from you any longer, my dear," the young man replied complacently.

Sarah made a grimace.

"To be perfectly candid," Lord Dredlinton intervened, throwing away his cigar and lighting a cigarette, "I am afraid it was my fault that we came in so soon. Poor sort of host, eh, Jimmy? Fact is, I'm nervous to-night. Every damned newspaper I've picked up seems to be launching thunderbolts at the B. & I. And now this is the third day and there's no news of Stanley."

"Every one seems to know about his disappearance," Jimmy remarked. "They were all talking about it at the club to-day."

"What do they say?" Lord Dredlinton asked eagerly. "They all leave off talking about it when I am round."

"Blooming mystery," the young man pronounced. "That's the conclusion every one seems to arrive at. A chap I know, whose chauffeur pals up with Rees' valet, told me that he's been having heaps of threatening letters from fellows who'd got the knock over the B. & I. He seemed to think they'd done him in."

Dredlinton shivered nervously.

"It's perfectly abominable," he declared. "Here we are supposed to have the finest police system in the world, and yet a man can disappear from his rooms in the very centre of London, and no one has even a clue as to what has become of him."

"Looks bad," Jimmy acknowledged.

"I don't understand much about business affairs," Sarah remarked, "but the B. & I. case does seem to be a remarkably unpopular undertaking."

Dredlinton kicked a footstool out of his way, frowning angrily.

"The B. & I. is only an ordinary business concern," he insisted. "We have a right to make money if we are clever enough to do it. We speculate in lots of other things besides wheat, and we have our losses to face as well as our profits. I believe that fellow Wingate is at the bottom of all this agitation. Just like those confounded Americans. Why can't they mind their own business!"

"It isn't very long," Josephine remarked drily, "since we were rather glad that America didn't mind her own business."

"Bosh!" her husband scoffed. "If English people are to be bullied and their liberty interfered with in this manner, we might as well have lost the war and become a German Colony."

"Don't agree with you, sir," Jimmy declared, with most unusual seriousness. "I don't like the way you are talking, and I'm dead off the B. & I. myself. I'd cut my connection with it, if I were you. Been looking for trouble for a long time—and, great Scot, I believe they're going to get it!"

"Damned rubbish!" Lord Dredlinton muttered angrily.

"Heavens! Jimmy's in earnest!" Sarah exclaimed, rising. "I am sure it's time we went. We are overdue at his mother's, and one of my cylinders is missing. Come on, Jimmy.—Good-by, Josephine dear! You'll forgive us if we hurry off? I did tell you we had to go directly after dinner, didn't I?"

"You did, dear," Josephine assented, walking towards the door with her friend. "Come in and see me again soon."

There was the sound of voices in the hall. Lord Dredlinton started eagerly.

"That's the fellow from Scotland Yard, I hope," he said. "Promised to come round to-night. Perhaps they've news of Stanley."

The door was thrown open, and the new butler ushered in a tall, thin man dressed in morning clothes of somewhat severe cut.

"Inspector Shields, my lord," he announced.



CHAPTER XIX

Lord Dredlinton's impatience was almost feverish. One would have imagined that Stanley Rees had been one of his dearest friends, instead of a young man whom he rather disliked.

"Come in. Inspector," he invited. "Come in. Glad to see you. Any news?"

"None whatever, my lord," was the laconic reply.

Dredlinton's face fell. He looked at his visitor, speechless for a moment. The inspector gravely saluted Josephine and accepted the chair to which she waved him.

"Upon my word," Dredlinton declared, "this is most unsatisfactory! Most disappointing!"

"I was afraid that you might find it so," the inspector assented.

Josephine turned in her chair and contemplated the latter with some interest. He was quietly dressed in well-cut but unobtrusive clothes. His long, narrow face had features of sensibility. His hair was grizzled a little at the temples. His composure seemed part of the man, passive and imperturbable.

"Isn't a disappearance of this sort rather unusual?" she enquired.

"Most unusual, your ladyship," the man admitted. "I scarcely remember a similar case."

"'Unusual' seems to me a mild word!" Dredlinton exclaimed angrily. "Here is a well-known young man, with friends in every circle of life and engagements at every hour, a partner in an important commercial undertaking, who is absolutely removed from his rooms in one of the best-known hotels in London, and at the end of three days the police are powerless to find out what has become of him!"

"Up to the present, my lord," the inspector confessed, "we certainly have no clue."

"But, dash it all, you must have some idea as to what has become of him?" his questioner insisted. "Young men don't disappear through the windows of the Milan Bar, do they?"

"If you assure us, my lord, that we may rule out any idea of a voluntary disappearance—"

"Voluntary disappearance be damned!" Dredlinton interrupted. "Don't let me hear any more of such rubbish! I can assure you that such a supposition is absolutely out of the question."

"Then in that case, my lord, I may put it to you that Mr. Rees' disappearance is due to the action of no ordinary criminal or blackmailer, but is part of a much more deeply laid scheme."

"Exactly what do you mean?" was the almost fierce demand.

"It appears that Mr. Rees," the inspector went on, speaking with some emphasis, "is connected with an undertaking which during the last few weeks has provoked a wave of anger and disgust throughout the country."

"Are you referring to the British and Imperial Granaries, Limited?" his interlocutor enquired.

"That, I believe, is the name of the company."

Lord Dredlinton's anxiety visibly increased. He was standing underneath the suspended globe of the electric light, his fingers nervously pulling to pieces the cigarette which he had been smoking. There was a look of fear in his weak eyes. Josephine surveyed him thoughtfully. The coward in him had flared up, and there was no room for any other characteristic. Fear was written in his face, trembled in his tone, betrayed itself in his gestures.

"But, dash it all," he expostulated, "there are other directors! I am one myself. Don't you see how serious this all is? If Rees can be spirited away and no one be able to lift up a finger to help him, what about the rest of us?"

"It was in my mind to warn your lordship," Shields observed.

Dredlinton's fear merged into fury,—a blind and nerveless passion.

"But this is outrageous!" he exclaimed, striking the table with his fist. "Do you mean to say that you can come here to me from Scotland Yard—to me, a peer of England, living in the heart of London—and tell me that a friend and a business connection of mine has been kidnapped and practically warn me against the same fate? What on earth do we pay our police for? What sort of a country are we living in? Are you all nincompoops?"

"We remain what we are, notwithstanding your lordship's opinion," the inspector answered, with a shade of sarcasm in his level tone. "I may add that I am not the only one engaged in this Investigation, and I can only do my duty according to the best of my ability."

"You've done nothing—nothing at all!" Dredlinton protested angrily. "Added to that, you actually come here and warn me that I, too, may be the victim of a plot, against the ringleaders of which you seem to be helpless. The British and Imperial Granaries is a perfectly legitimate company doing a perfectly legitimate business. We're not out for our health—who is in the City? If we can make money out of wheat, it's our business and nobody else's."

The inspector was a little weary, but he continued without any sign of impatience.

"I know nothing about the British and Imperial Granaries, my lord," he said. "My time is too fully occupied to take any interest in outside affairs. In the course of time," he went on, "we shall inevitably get to the bottom of this very cleverly engineered conspiracy. Crime of every sort is detected sooner or later, except in the case, say, of a single-handed murder, or an offence of that nature. In the present instance, there is evidence that a very large number of persons were concerned, and detection finally becomes, therefore, a certainty. In the meantime, however, I thought it as well to pass you a word of warning."

"Warning, indeed!" Dredlinton muttered. "I won't move out of the house without a bodyguard. If any one dares to interfere with me, I'll—I'll shoot them! What happens to a man, Inspector, if he shoots another in self-defence, eh?"

"It depends upon the circumstances, my lord," was the cautious reply. "The law in England requires self-defence to be very clearly established."

Dredlinton moved to the sideboard, poured himself out a liqueur and drank it off.

"Will you take something. Inspector?" he asked, turning around.

"I thank your lordship, no!"

Dredlinton thrust his hands into his pockets and returned to his seat.

"I don't want to lose my temper," he said,—"I am perfectly cool, as you see, Inspector—-but put yourself in my position now. Don't you think it's enough to make a man furious to have an official from Scotland Yard come into his house here in the heart of London and warn him that he is in danger of being kidnapped?"

"I don't think that I went quite so far as that," the inspector objected, "nor do I in any way suggest that, sooner or later, the people who are responsible for Mr. Rees' disappearance will not be brought to justice. But I considered it my duty to point out to you that the directors of your company appear to have excited a feeling throughout the whole of England, which might well bring you enemies wholly unconnected with the ordinary criminal classes. That is where our difficulty lies."

Lord Dredlinton had the air of a man argued into reasonableness.

"I see, Inspector. I quite understand," he declared. "But listen to me. I shall throw myself upon your protection. In Mr. Rees' absence, it is of vital importance, during the next few days, that nothing should happen to Mr. Phipps, Mr. Martin or myself. You must have us all shadowed. You must see that I am not lost sight of for a moment. Here is a little earnest of what is to come," he went on, drawing out his pocketbook and passing a folded note over towards his visitor, "and remember, Mr. Phipps has offered five hundred pounds for the discovery of the person who is responsible for his nephew's disappearance."

Shields made no movement towards the money. He shook his head gently.

"I shall be glad to take the reward, my lord, if I am fortunate enough to earn it," he said, rising to his feet. "Until then I do not require payment for my services."

Dredlinton replaced the note in his pocket.

"Just as you like, of course, Inspector. I only meant it as a little incentive. And I want you to remember this—do rub it into your Chief—I have already called to see him twice, and it doesn't seem to me that the authorities are looking upon our position seriously enough. We have a right to the utmost protection the law can give us, and further, I must insist upon it that every effort is made to discover Mr. Rees before it is too late."

The butler stood on the threshold. He had entered in response to Lord Dredlinton's ring, with the perfect silence and promptitude of the best of his class. His master stared at him for a moment uneasily. The man's appearance, grave and respectable though he was, seemed to have startled him.

"Show the inspector out," he directed. "Good night, Mr. Shields."

The man bowed to Josephine.

"Good night, my lord!"

Dredlinton stared at the closed door. Then he turned around with a little gesture of anger.

"Every damned thing that happens, nowadays, seems designed to irritate me!" he exclaimed. "That man Shields is nothing but a poopstick!"

"I differ from you entirely," Josephine declared. "I thought that he seemed a very intelligent person, with unusual powers of self-restraint."

"Shows what your judgment is worth! I can't think what Scotland Yard are about, to put the greatest lout they have in the service on to an important business like this. And what the mischief are we always changing servants for? There were two new men at dinner, and that butler of yours gives me the creeps. What on earth has become of Jacob?"

"You told Jacob yourself to go to hell, a few days ago," Josephine reminded him. "You can scarcely expect any self-respecting butler to stand your continual abuse."

"Or a self-respecting wife, eh?" he sneered.

Josephine regarded him coldly.

"One's servants," she remarked, "have an advantage. Jacob has found a better place."

"Precisely what you'd like to do yourself, eh?"

"Precisely what I intend to do before long."

"Well, then, why don't you do it?" he demanded brutally. "You think that everything I said the other day was bluff, eh, and that Stanley Rees' disappearance has driven everything else out of my head? Well, you're wrong, madam. As soon as this infernal business is done with, I am going to pay a visit to my lawyers."

"For once," she said, with a faint smile, "you will take my good wishes with you."

"You mean," he exclaimed, moving from his place and standing before her with his hands in his pockets, "that you want to get rid of me, eh?"

She met his scowling gaze fearlessly.

"Of course I do. I don't think that any woman could have lived with you as long as I have and not want to get rid of you. On the other hand, as you know—as in your heart you know perfectly well," she went on, "I have remained a faithful wife to you, and it is not my intention to have you take advantage of a situation for which you were entirely responsible. You will have to remember, Henry, that the reason for my leaving your house in the middle of the night will scarcely help your case."

Dredlinton stood and glared at his wife, his eyes narrowing, his mean little mouth curled.

"Josephine," he cried, "I don't care a damn about your leaving my house, then or at any time, but the more I think of it, the stranger it seems to me that this friend of yours, Wingate, should come to the office and threaten me for my connection with the B. & I., and at the moment of leaving offer to sell wheat. I am getting a little suspicious about your friend, my lady. I have given them the tip at Scotland Yard and I only hope they take advantage of it."

"Why single out Mr. Wingate?" she asked, "He certainly is not alone in his antipathy to your company."

"Don't I know that?" Dredlinton exclaimed angrily. "Don't I get a dozen threatening letters a day? Men take me on one side and reason with me in the club. I had a Cabinet Minister at the office this afternoon. I begin to get the cold shoulder wherever I turn, but, damn it all, don't you understand that we must have money?"

Josephine regarded him with a cold lack of sympathy in her face.

"I understand that you have had about a hundred thousand pounds of mine," she remarked.

"Like your generosity, my dear, to remind me of it," he sneered. "To you it seems, I suppose, a great deal of money. To me—well, I am not sure that it was fair compensation for what I have never had."

"What you have never had, you never deserved, Henry."

He flung himself towards the door.

"Josephine," he said, looking back, "do you know you are one of the few women in the world I can't even talk to? You freeze me up every time I try. I wonder whether the man who is so anxious to stand in my shoes—"

She was suddenly erect, her eyes flaming. He shuffled out and slammed the door after him with a little nervous laugh.



CHAPTER XX

Josephine was herself again within a few moments of her husband's departure. She stood perfectly still for some time, as though listening to his departing footsteps. Then she crossed the room and pressed the bell twice. Once more she listened. The change in her expression was wonderful. She was expectant, eager, thrilled with the contemplation of some imminent happening. Her vigil came suddenly to an end, as the door was opened and closed again a little abruptly. It was no servant who had obeyed her summons; it was Wingate who entered, unannounced and alone.

"Everything goes well?" he asked, as he advanced rapidly into the room.

"Absolutely!"

"Good! Where is your husband now?"

"Gone to his den to have a drink, I expect," she replied. "He is in a terrible state of nerves already."

"I am afraid he will be worse before we've done with him," Wingate remarked a little grimly. "Josephine, just one moment!"

She was in his arms and forgetfulness enfolded them. He felt the soft cling of her body, the warm sweetness of her lips. It was she who disengaged herself.

"I am terrified of Henry coming back," she admitted, as she moved reluctantly away. "He is in one of his most hateful moods to-night. Better than anything in the world he would love to make a scene."

"He shall have all the opportunity he wants presently," Wingate observed.

The door was opened with the soft abruptness of one who has approached it noiselessly by design. Dredlinton stood upon the threshold, blinking a little as he gazed into the room. He recognized Wingate with a start of amazement.

"Wingate?" he exclaimed. "Why the mischief didn't any one tell me you were here?"

"Mr. Wingate called to see me," Josephine replied.

There was an ugly curl upon Dredlinton's lips. He opened his mouth and closed it again. Then his truculent attitude suddenly vanished without the slightest warning. He became an entirely altered person.

"Look here, Wingate," he confessed, "on thinking it over, I believe I've been making rather an idiot of myself. Josephine," he went on, turning to his wife, "be so kind as to leave us alone for a short time."

He opened the door. Josephine hesitated for a moment, then, in response to a barely noticeable gesture from Wingate, she left the room. Her husband closed the door carefully behind her. His attitude, as he turned once more towards the other man, was distinctly conciliatory.

"Wingate," he invited, "sit down, won't you, and smoke a cigar with me. Let us have a reasonable chat together, I am perfectly convinced that there is nothing for us to quarrel about."

"Since when have you come to that conclusion, Lord Dredlinton?" Wingate asked, without abandoning his somewhat uncompromising attitude.

"Since our interview at the office."

"You mean when you tried to blackmail me into selling my shipping shares?"

Dredlinton frowned.

"'Blackmail' is not a word to be used between gentlemen," he protested. "Look here, can't you behave like a decent fellow—an ordinary human being, you know? You are not exactly my sort, but I am sure you're a man of honour, I haven't any objection to your friendship with my wife—none in the world."

"The sentiments which I entertain for your wife, Lord Dredlinton," Wingate declared, "are not sentiments of friendship."

Dredlinton paused in the act of lighting a cigar.

"What's that?" he exclaimed. "You mean that, after all, you've humbugged me, both of you?"

"Not in the way you seem to imagine. This much, however, is true, and it is just as well that you should know it. I love your wife and I intend to take her from you, in her time and mine."

Dredlinton lit his cigar and threw himself back into his chair.

"Well, you don't mince matters," he muttered.

"I see no reason why I should," was the calm reply.

"After all," Dredlinton observed, with a cynical turn of the lips, "I see no reason why I should object. Josephine's been no wife of mine for years. Perhaps you have a fancy for your love affairs wrapped up in a little ice frosting."

Wingate's eyes flashed.

"That'll do," he advised, with ominous calm.

"Eh?"

"We will not discuss your wife."

Dredlinton shrugged his shoulders.

"As you will. Assist me, then, in my office of host. What or whom shall we discuss? Choose your own subject."

"The disappearance of Stanley Rees, if you like," was the unexpected reply.

Dredlinton stared at his visitor. Symptoms of panic were beginning to reassert themselves.

"You admit, then, that you were concerned in that?"

"Concerned in it?" Wingate repeated. "I think I can venture a little further than that."

"What do you mean?" was the startled query.

"I mean that I was and am entirely responsible for it."

Dredlinton's cigar fell from his fingers. For the moment he forgot to pick it up. Then he stooped and with shaking fingers threw it into the grate. When he confronted Wingate again, his face was deadly pale. He seemed, indeed, on the point of collapse.

"Why have you done this?" he faltered. "Tell me what you mean, man, when you say that you were responsible for his disappearance?"

"You are curious? Perhaps a little superstitious, a little nervous about yourself, eh?"

"What the devil have you done with Stanley Rees?" Dredlinton demanded.

Wingate smiled.

"Rees," he said, "as I reminded you, is the youngest of the British and Imperial directors. Let me see, next to him would come Phipps, I suppose. Martin, as you may have heard, left for Paris this morning—ostensibly. I have an idea myself that his destination is South America."

"Martin gone?" the other gasped.

"Without a doubt. I think he saw trouble ahead. By the by, have you heard anything of Phipps lately? Why not ring up and enquire about his health?"

Dredlinton stared a little wildly at the speaker. Then he hurried to the telephone, snatched up the receiver and talked into it, his eyes all the time fixed upon Wingate in a sort of frightened stare.

"Mayfair 365," he demanded. "Quick, please! An urgent call! Yes? Who's that? Yes, yes! Browning—Mr. Phipps' secretary. I understand. Where's Mr. Phipps?—What?"

Dredlinton drew away from the telephone for a moment. He dabbed his forehead with his handkerchief. He looked like a man on the verge of collapse.

"Something unusual seems to have happened," Wingate remarked softly.

Dredlinton was listening once more to the voice at the other end of the telephone.

"You've tried his club? Eh? And the restaurant where he was to have dined? What do you say? Kept them waiting and never turned up? You've rung up the police?—What do they say?—Doing their best?—My God!"

The receiver slipped from his nerveless fingers. He turned around to face Wingate, crouching over the table, his arms resting upon it, his eyes blood-shot, a slave to abject fear.

"Peter Phipps has disappeared!" he gasped weakly.

The atmosphere of the room seemed to have completely changed during the last few minutes. Wingate was no longer the conventional and casual caller. His face had hardened, his eyes were brighter, his manner ominous. He was the modern figure of Fate, playing for a desperate stake with cold and deadly earnestness. Dredlinton was simply panic-stricken. He was white to the lips; his eyes were filled with the frightened gleam of the trapped animal; he shook and twitched in a paroxysm of nervous collapse. He seemed terrified yet fascinated by the strange metamorphosis in his visitor.

"This is your doing?" he cried.

"It is my doing," Wingate admitted, with his eyes still fixed upon the other's face.

Dredlinton stumbled to the fireplace, found the bell and pressed it violently. A gleam of reassurance came to him.

"My servants shall hear you repeat that!" he exclaimed. "I will have them all in to witness your confession. You are pleading guilty to a crime! I shall send out for the police! I shall hand you over from here!"

"Not a bad idea," Wingate acknowledged. "By the by, though," he added, a moment or two later, "your servants don't seem in a great hurry to answer that bell."

Dredlinton pressed it more violently than ever. By listening intently both men could hear its faraway summons. But nothing happened. The house itself seemed empty. There was not even the sound of a footfall.

"You will really have to change your servants," Wingate continued. "Fancy not answering a bell! They must hear it pealing away. Still, you have the telephone. Why not ring up Scotland Yard direct?"

Dredlinton, dazed now with terror, took his fingers from the bell and snatched up the telephone receiver. All the time his eyes were riveted upon his companion's, their weak depths filled with a nameless horror.

"Quick!" he shouted down the receiver. "Scotland Yard! Put me straight through to Scotland Yard!—Can you hear me, Exchange? I am Lord Dredlinton, 1887 Mayfair. If I am cut off, ring through to Scotland Yard yourself. Tell them I am in danger of my life! Tell them to rush here at once!"

"Yes, they had better hurry," Wingate said tersely.

Dredlinton pulled down the hook of the receiver desperately.

"Can't you hear me, Exchange?" he shouted. "Quick! This is urgent!"

"Really," Wingate remarked, "the telephone people seem almost as negligent as your servants."

The receiver slipped from the hysterical man's fingers. He collapsed into a chair and leaned across the table.

"What does it mean?" he demanded hoarsely. "No one will answer the bell. I seem to be speaking through the telephone to a dead world."

"If you really want some one, I dare say I can help you," Wingate replied. "The telephone was disconnected by my orders, as soon as you had spoken to Phipps' rooms. But—now you are only wasting your time."

Dredlinton had rushed to the door, shaken the handle violently, only to find it locked. He pommelled with his fists upon the panels.

"Come, come," his companion expostulated, "there is really no need for such extremes. You want something, perhaps? Allow me."

Wingate crossed the room, rang the bell three times quickly, and stood in an easy attitude upon the hearth rug, with his hands behind his back.

"Let us see," he said, "whether that has any effect or not."

"Is this your house or mine?" Dredlinton demanded.

"Your house," was the laconic reply, "but my servants."

From outside was heard the sound of a turning key. The door was opened. Grant, the new butler, made his appearance,—a thin, determined-looking man, with white hair and keen dark eyes, who bore a striking resemblance to Mr. Andrew Slate.

"His lordship wants the whisky and soda brought in here, Grant," Wingate told him, "and—wait just a moment.—You seem very much distressed about the disappearance of your friends, Lord Dredlinton. Would you like to see them?"

"What? See Stanley Rees and Peter Phipps now?"

"Yes!"

"You are talking nonsense!" Dredlinton shouted. "You may know where they are—I should think it is very likely that you do—but you aren't going to persuade me that you've got them here in my house—that you can turn them loose when you choose to say the word!"

Wingate glanced across at the butler, who nodded understandingly and withdrew. Dredlinton intercepted the look and shook his fist.

"You've been tampering with my servants, damn you!" he exclaimed.

"Well, they haven't been yours very long, have they?" Wingate reminded him.

"So this is all part of a plot!" Dredlinton continued, with increasing apprehension. "They are in your pay, are they? It was only this morning I noticed all these new faces around me.—God help us!"

The words seemed to melt away from his lips. The door had been flung open, and a queer little procession entered. First of all came Grant, followed by a footman leading Peter Phipps by the arm. Phipps' hands were tied together. A gag in the form of a respirator covered his mouth. Cords which had apparently only just been unknotted were around each leg. He had the expression, of a man completely dazed. After him came another of the footmen leading Stanley Rees, who was in similar straits. The latter, however, perhaps by reason of his longer detention, showed none of the passivity of his companion. He struggled violently, even in the few yards between the door and the centre of the room, Wingate motioned to a third footman, who had followed behind.

"Pull out that round table," he directed. "Place three chairs around it.—So!—Sit down, Phipps. Sit down, Rees."

They obeyed, Rees only after a further useless struggle. Dredlinton, who had been speechless for the last few seconds, gazed with horror-stricken eyes at the third chair. Wingate smiled at him grimly.

"That third chair, Dredlinton," he announced, "is for you."

The terrified man made an ineffectual dash for the door.

"You mean to make a prisoner of me in my own house?" he shouted, as he found himself in the clutches of one of the footmen. "What fool's game is this? You know you can't keep it up, Wingate. You'll be transported, man. Come, confess it's a joke. Tell that man to take these damned cords away."

"It is a joke," Wingate assured him gravely, "but it may need a very peculiar sense of humour to appreciate it. However, you need not fear. Your life is not threatened.—Now, Dickenson, the loaf."

The third man stepped back to the door and, from the hands of another servant who was waiting there, took an ordinary cottage loaf of bread. The three men now were seated around the table, bound to their chairs and gagged. In the middle of the table, just beyond their reach, Wingate, leaning over them, placed the loaf of bread.

"I am now," he announced, standing a little back, "going to tell Grant to release your gags. You will probably all try shouting. I can assure you that it is quite hopeless. This room looks out, as you know, upon a courtyard. The street is on the other side of the house. Every person under this roof is in my employ. There is no earthly chance of your being heard by any one. Still, if it pleases you to shout, shout!—Now, Grant!"

The man unfastened the gags,—first Phipps', then Rees', and finally Dredlinton's. Curiously enough, not one of the three men raised their voices. Wingate's words seemed to have impressed them. Phipps drew one or two deep breaths, Stanley Rees rubbed his mouth on his sleeve. Dredlinton was the only one who broke into anything approaching violent speech.

"My God, Wingate," he exclaimed, "if you think I'll ever forget this, you're mistaken! I'll see you in prison for it, whatever it costs me!"

"The after-consequences of this little melodrama," Phipps interposed, with grim fury, "certainly present something of a problem, I have wondered, during the last hour or so, whether you can be perfectly sane, Wingate. What good can you expect to do by this brigandage?"

"The very word 'brigandage'," Wingate observed, with a smile, "suggests my answer—ransom."

"But you can't want money?" Phipps protested.

"You know what I want," was the stern rejoinder. "You and I have already discussed it when you came to see me about that young man."

Phipps laughed uneasily.

"I remember some preposterous suggestion about selling wheat," he admitted. "If you think, however, that you can alter our entire business principles by a piece of foolery like this, you are making the mistake of your life."

"We are wasting time," Wingate declared a little shortly. "It is better that we have a complete understanding. Get this into your head," he went on, drawing a long, ugly-looking pistol from his trousers pocket, and displaying it. "This is the finest automatic pistol in the world, and I am one of the best marksmen in the American Army. I shall leave you, for the present, ungagged, but if rescue comes to you by any efforts of your own, I give you my word of honour as an American gentleman that I shall shoot the three of you and be proud of my night's work."

"And swing for it afterwards," Dredlinton threatened. "The man's mad!"

"The man is in earnest," Phipps growled. "That much, at least, I think we can grant him. What is the meaning of that piece of mummery, Wingate?" he added, pointing to the loaf of bread. "What are your terms? You must state them, sooner or later. Let us have them now."

"Agreed," Wingate replied. "The costs of that loaf is, I believe, to be exact, one and tenpence ha'penny—one and tenpence ha'penny to poor people whose staple food it is. When you sign an authority to sell wheat in sufficient bulk to bring the cost down to sixpence, you can have the loaf and go as soon as the sale is finished. You will find here," he went on, laying a document upon the table, "a calculation which may help you. Your approximate holdings of wheat may be exaggerated a trifle, although these lists came from some one in your own office, but I think you will find that the figures there will be of assistance to you when you decide to give the word."

"Let me get this clearly into my head," Phipps begged, after a moment's amazed silence, "without the possibility of any mistake. You mean that we are to sell wheat at about sixty per cent, less than the present market value—in many cases sixty per cent. less than we gave for it?"

"That, I imagine, will be about the position," Wingate admitted.

"The man is a fool!" Rees snarled. "It would mean ruin."

Wingate remained impassive.

"The British and Imperial Granaries, Limited," he said, "has been responsible for the ruin of a good many people. It is time now that the pendulum swung the other way.—Come, make up your minds."

"What if we refuse?" Dredlinton asked.

"You will be made a little more secure," Wingate explained, "your gags fastened, and your arms corded to the backs of the chairs."

"But for how long?"

"Until you give the word."

"And supposing we never give the word?" Stanley Rees demanded.

"Then you sit there," Wingate replied, "until you die."

Dredlinton glanced covertly across at Phipps, and, finding no inspiration there, turned to Wingate. The light of an evil imagining shone in his eyes.

"This is a matter which we ought to discuss in private conference," he said slowly. "What do you think, Phipps?"

"I agree—"

"I am afraid," Wingate interrupted suavely, "that Mr. Phipps' views will not affect the situation. You three gentlemen are my treasured and honoured guests. I shall not desert you—as a matter of fact, I shall scarcely leave you, except upon your own business—until your decision is made."

"Guests be damned!" Dredlinton exclaimed. "It's my house—not yours!"

"Mine for a short time by appropriation," Wingate answered, with a faint smile.

"Supposing," Rees suggested, "we were induced to knuckle under, to become the victims of your damned blackmailing scheme, surely then one of us would be allowed to go down to the City on parole, eh?"

Wingate shook his head.

"I regret to say that I should not feel justified in letting one of you out of my sight. In the event of your seeing reason, the telephone will be at your disposal, and a verbal message by its means could be confirmed by all three of you. I imagine that your office would sell on such instructions."