declined and there was an end.
But another and a graver matter remained. He had desired wealth to save Yarleys, but he desired it still more for a different purpose. Above everything on earth he loved Barbara, his distant cousin and the niece of Mr. Champers-Haswell, who until an hour ago had been his partner. Now she was a great heiress, and without fortune he could not marry her, even if she would marry him, which remained in doubt. For one thing her uncle and guardian Haswell, under her father’s will, had absolute discretion in this matter until she reached the age of twenty-five, and for another he was too proud. Therefore it would seem that in abandoning his business, he had abandoned his chance of Barbara also, which was a truly dreadful thought.
Well, it was in order that he might see her, that he had agreed to visit The Court on the morrow, even though it meant a meeting with his late partners, who were the last people with whom he desired to foregather again so soon. Then and there he made up his mind that before he bade Barbara farewell, he would tell her the whole story, so that she might not misjudge him. After that he would go off somewhere—to Africa perhaps. Meanwhile he was quite tired out, as tired as though he had lain a week in the grip of fever. He must eat some food and get to bed. Sufficient unto the day was the evil thereof, yet on the whole he blessed the name of Jackson, editor of The Judge and his father’s old friend.
When Alan had left the office Sir Robert turned to Mr. Champers-Haswell and asked him abruptly, “What the devil does this mean?”
Mr. Haswell looked up at the ceiling and whistled in his own peculiar fashion, then answered:
“I cannot say for certain, but our young friend’s strange conduct seems to suggest that he has smelt a rat, possibly even that Jackson, the old beast, has shown him a rat—of a large Turkish breed.”
Sir Robert nodded.
“Vernon is a fellow who doesn’t like rats; they seem to haunt his sleep,” he said; “but do you think that having seen it, he will keep it in the bag?”
“Oh! certainly, certainly,” answered Mr. Haswell with cheerfulness; “the man is the soul of honour; he will never give us away. Look how he behaved about those shares. Still, I think that perhaps we are well rid of him. Too much honour, like too much zeal, is a very dangerous quality in any business.”
“I don’t know that I agree with you,” answered Sir Robert. “I am not sure that in the long run we should not do better for a little more of the article. For my part, although it will not hurt us publicly, for the thing will never be noticed, I am sorry that we have lost Vernon, very sorry indeed. I don’t think him a fool, and awkward as they may be, I respect his qualities.”
“So do I, so do I,” answered Mr. Haswell, “and of course we have acted against his advice throughout, which must have been annoying to him. The scheme as he suggested it was a fair business proposition that might have paid ten per cent. on a small capital, but what is the good of ten per cent. to you and me? We want millions and we are going to get them. Well, he is coming to The Court to-morrow, and perhaps after all we shall be able to arrange matters. I’ll give Barbara a hint; she has great influence with him, and you might do the same, Aylward.”
“Miss Champers has great influence with everyone who is fortunate enough to know her,” answered Sir Robert courteously. “But even if she chooses to use it, I doubt if it will avail in this case. Vernon has been making up his mind for a long while. I have watched him and am sure of that. To-night he determined to take the plunge and I do not think that we shall see any more of him in this office. Haswell,” he added with sudden energy, “I tell you that of late our luck has been too good to last. The boom, the real boom, came in with Vernon, and with Vernon I think that it will go.”
“At any rate it must leave something pretty substantial behind it this time, Aylward, my friend. Whatever happens, within a week we shall be rich, really rich for life.”
“For life, Haswell, yes, for life. But what is life? A bubble that any pin may prick. Oh! I know that you do not like the subject, but it is as well to look it in the face sometimes. I’m no church-goer, but if I remember right we were taught to pray the good Lord to deliver us especially ‘in all times of our wealth,’ which is followed by something about tribulation and sudden death, for when they wrote that prayer the wheel of human fortune went round just as it does to-day. There, let’s get out of this before I grow superstitious, as men who believe in nothing sometimes do, because after all they must believe in something, I suppose. Got your hat and coat? So have I, come on,” and he switched off the light, so that the room was left in darkness except for the faint glimmering of the fire.
His partner grumbled audibly, for in turning he had knocked his hand against the desk.
“Leave me my only economy, Haswell,” he answered with a hard little laugh. “Electricity is strength and I hate to see strength burning to waste. Why do you mind?” he went on as he stepped towards the door. “Is it the contrast? In all times of our wealth, in all times of our tribulation, from sickness and from sudden death——”
“Good Lord deliver us,” chimed in Mr. Haswell in a shaking voice behind him. “What the devil’s that?”
Sir Robert looked round and saw, or thought that he saw, something very strange. From the pillar on which it stood the golden fetish with a woman’s face, appeared to have floated. The firelight showed it gliding towards them across, but a few inches above the floor of the great room. It came very slowly, but it came. Now it reached them and paused, and now it rose into the air until it attained the height of Mr. Champers-Haswell and stayed there, staring into his face and not a hand’s breadth away, just as though it were a real woman glaring at him.
He uttered a sound, half whistle and half groan, and fell back, as it chanced on to a morocco-covered seat behind him. For a moment or two the gleaming, golden mask floated in the air. Then it turned very deliberately, rose a little way, and moving sidelong to where Sir Robert stood, hung in front of his face.
Presently Aylward staggered to the mantelpiece and began to fumble for the switch; in the silence his nails scratching at the panelling made a sound like to that of a gnawing mouse. He found it at last, and next instant the office broke into a blaze of light, showing Mr. Haswell, his rubicund face quite pale, his hat and umbrella on the floor, gasping like a dying man upon the couch, and Sir Robert himself clinging to the mantel-shelf as a person might do who had received a mortal wound, while the golden fetish reposed calmly on its pillar, to all appearance as immovable and undisturbed as the antique Venus which matched it at the other end of the room. For a while there was silence. Then Sir Robert, recovering himself, asked:
“Did you notice anything unusual just now, Haswell?”
“Yes,” whispered his partner. “I thought that hideous African thing which Vernon brought here, came sliding across the floor and stared into my face with its glittering eyes, and in the eyes——”
“Well, what was in the eyes?”
“I can’t remember. It was a kind of picture and the meaning of it was Sudden Death—oh Lord! Sudden Death. Tell me it was a fancy bred of that ill-omened talk of yours?”
“I can’t tell you anything of the sort,” answered Aylward in a hollow voice, “for I saw something also.”
“What?” asked his partner.
“Death that wasn’t sudden, and other things.”
Again the silence fell till it was broken by Aylward.
“Come,”
