Lavendale walked slowly down the sunny side of Pall Mall. It was early in August, and for the first time he seemed to notice some reflection in the faces of the passers-by of the burden under which the country was groaning. The usual fashionable little throng about the entrance to the Carlton, was represented by a few sombrely-dressed women and one or two wounded warriors. The glances of the passers-by towards the contents bill of the evening papers had in them a certain furtive eagerness, the fear of evil news triumphing now over the sanguine optimism of earlier days. It was just at that tragical epoch when Russia, to the amazement of the whole world, was being swept back from her frontier cities, when there were murmurs of an investment of Petrograd. Lavendale, in his light grey suit and straw hat, sunburnt, over six feet tall, broad and athletic, seemed somehow a strange figure as he passed along through streets which appeared destitute of a single man under middle-age who was not in khaki. The recruiting sergeant at the corner of Trafalgar Square, where Lavendale paused for a moment to cross the road, caught his eye and smiled insinuatingly.
'Fine figure for a uniform, sir,' he ventured.
'I am an alien,' Lavendale replied, watching a troop of recruits pass by.
'American, sir?'
'That's so,' Lavendale admitted.
The sergeant looked him up and down and sighed.
'America's a country, begging your pardon, sir, that don't seem to have much stomach for fighting,' he remarked, as the young man passed on.
Lavendale crossed the street with a slight frown upon his forehead. He made his way to the War Office and found Captain Merrill in his room alone. The two men exchanged the greetings of intimate friends.
'Say, Reggie,' Lavendale began, 'you folks are getting kind of nervy, aren't you? A recruiting sergeant in Trafalgar Square has just gently intimated to me that I belong to a country which has no stomach for fighting.'
Merrill grinned as he tossed his cigarette case over.
'Well,' he remarked, 'you don't seem to be exactly spoiling for the fray, do you?'
Lavendale lit a cigarette.
'Look here,' he said, 'it's all very well for you fellows to talk. You've got the war fever in your blood. You're in it deep yourselves and there's a sort of gloomy satisfaction in seeing every one else in the same box. The chap who goes out to provoke a fight is worse, of course, but the one who springs up and reaches for his gun at the first chance of joining in, is playing his game, isn't he?'
'Perhaps you are right,' Merrill admitted.
'I'm not telling you or any one else exactly what my opinion is about America's policy,' Lavendale continued. 'I'll only remind you that, even when those truculent forefathers of ours went out to fight, they stopped to put on their armour. Is there anything fresh?'
'I don't know,' was the somewhat doubtful reply. 'There is a queer sort of feeling of apprehension everywhere this morning. The Chief's been round to see the Prime Minister and on to the Admiralty. There's a rumour that he went round to Buckingham Palace, too. Looks as though there were something up.'
'You know all about it, I suppose,' Lavendale remarked quietly.
'Not a thing!'
The young American knocked the ash from his cigarette.
'The history of this war,' he went on, 'will make mighty interesting reading, but there's another history, a history that will never be written, the history of the unrecorded things. Gee, that would make people gossip if they could get hold of only a few chapters of it! You know there's something strange afoot, Reggie. So do I, though we sit here lying to one another. I doubt whether the man in the street will ever know.'
Merrill selected another cigarette.
'I don't see where you come in here, Ambrose.'
'Neither do I,' the other agreed. 'Still, the truth comes to light in strange ways sometimes. Last night I had a cable from a friend in Petrograd, advising me to buy all Russian securities.'
'Well?'
'If there is to be any change for the better in the valuations of Russian stock,' Lavendale continued slowly, 'that is to say any immediate change, it can only mean one thing.'
Merrill struggled hard to preserve his expression of polite vacuity.
'There are very few people,' he murmured, 'who really understand Russia.'
Lavendale shrugged his shoulders.
'It isn't exactly my show, you know!'
'It ought to be,' Merrill retorted curtly.
'Why?'
'Just common-sense. If we don't win in this war, it will be your turn next. Japan and Germany you'll have to face—you can take my word for that—and I hope you'll like it. If we lose our Fleet, it's good-bye to American independence.'
'Plain and simple words, young fellow!'
'Not so plain or so simple as they are true.'
Lavendale threw away his cigarette and stretched out his hand for his hat.
'Well,' he said, 'I used to flatter myself that I was an out-and-out neutral, but I'm beginning to fancy that my sympathies are leaning a little towards your side of the show. Anyhow, I've no reason to keep secret the little I know about this affair—in fact I came down here to tell you. New York was talking openly last night of peace being proclaimed between Germany and Russia within a week.'
'We've tried her sorely,' Merrill confessed doggedly, 'but I don't believe it.'
Lavendale rose to his feet.
'I tell you, Merrill,' he said, 'if you'd been about town as much as I have for the last twenty-four hours, you'd begin to wonder yourself whether something wasn't amiss. These rumours and feelings of depression are one of the strangest features of the war, but there it is at the present moment, in the streets and the clubs and the restaurants—wherever you turn. I've noticed nothing like it since the beginning of the war. The optimists are still cackling away, but it's there all the same—a grim, disheartening fear. One man told me last night that he knew for a fact that Russia was on the point of suing for peace.'
Merrill shook his head as he resumed his place at his desk.
'It's just a phase,' he declared. 'Look in and see me again, Ambrose, when you're feeling a little more cheerful.' ...
Lavendale made a call in the Strand and passed along that crowded, illuminative thoroughfare towards the Milan. Everywhere the faces of the passers-by seemed indicative of some new apprehension. He bought an early paper, but there was no word in it of any change in the situation. On any printed presentation of the rumours which were on every one's tongue, the censor had set his foot.
Lavendale called in at the bar at the Milan for a few minutes. The same feeling was there even more in evidence.
'What's it all mean?' he asked an American pressman whom he knew slightly.
The newspaper man nodded sagely.
'Guess the cat's out of the bag now,' he opined. 'Russia has asked for peace and she is going to have it on generous terms. They say that negotiations are going on right here, under the Britisher's very nose. Things'll be pretty lively here soon.'
Lavendale took his place in the luncheon-room, a few minutes later. As usual he glanced expectantly towards the corner which Suzanne de Freyne frequently occupied. There were no signs of her to-day, however. He gave his order and leaned back in his place. Then some fancy impelled him to glance towards the glass entrance doors on his left. He sprang at once to his feet. Suzanne, her face whiter than ever, a queer, furtive gleam in her dark eyes, was looking eagerly into the room. She saw him almost at the same moment and hurried in.
'Suzanne!' he exclaimed. 'What luck! You are going to lunch with me, of course?'
Amaître d'hôtelwas holding the vacant chair at his table. With a little sigh she relapsed into it. She was plainly dressed and had the appearance of having newly arrived from a journey.
'I suppose I had better have something to eat,' she sighed. 'Order something—anything,' she added, brushing the carte away. 'It was you I came to see.'
He recognized at once the fact that she was in no humour for trivialities. He gave a brief order to the waiters, waved them away and leaned towards her.
'You can command me,' he assured her. 'My time is yours.'
She drew a little sigh of relief. For a moment her little white fingers rested upon his strong brown hand, the tenseness passed from her manner, it was as though she found something composing in his strength.
'I have been travelling for forty-eight hours,' she said, speaking under her breath, 'and I had an escape, a very narrow escape, in Belgium. You do not want to understand everything, do you?'
'Nothing more than you choose,' he replied. 'I am your Man Friday.'
'Listen, then. Your car—it is in order?'
'Perfect. I came up from Bath the day before yesterday—sixty miles on the level and never changed speeds.'
'How long would it take you to get me down to the east coast?' she asked eagerly.
'What part?'
She hesitated.
'A small place called Blakeney, between Sheringham and Wells.'
He figured it out.
'Let me see,' he said,—'two hours to Newmarket, two more to Fakenham, saving a little on both runs if we escaped a puncture—say four hours and a half, Suzanne.'
'And your car?'
'In the garage, five minutes away in a taxicab.'
She breathed another sigh of relief.
'Now I shall eat some luncheon,' she declared. 'You will not mind if we commit ourselves to rather a wild-goose adventure?'
'I shall enjoy it immensely,' he assured her, 'if one can use such a word at all these days.'
He ordered some wine and watched the colour come back to her cheeks. Towards the end of the meal, however, she glanced often at the clock. He read her thoughts, signed his bill and stood up.
'I am going upstairs to my room for a moment,' she said briskly. 'Will you have a taxicab waiting?'
'Of course!'
She was gone barely ten minutes. When she came down she carried a small travelling case and wore a thick veil. He hurried her into the taxi, drove to the garage, and in less than half-an-hour London lay behind them, and the car was gathering speed at every moment. They passed through Finchley and Potter's Bar, slowed up through St. Albans, and settled down at racing speed, northwards. Suzanne opened her eyes.
'I am having a delicious rest,' she murmured.
'Where would you like some tea?' he inquired.
'Not yet. Push on as far as you can,' she begged. 'What time shall we reach Fakenham?'
He glanced at the clock on the splashboard.
'If you really like to run right through,' he said, 'you shall be there by six o'clock.'
She patted the hand which gripped the steering wheel.
'You dear person!' she exclaimed softly. 'Now I close my eyes again. I think I will sleep a little. Until I reached my rooms at twelve o'clock to-day I had not had my clothes off for two days. This air and the rest are wonderful.'
She settled back in her place and he touched the accelerator with his foot. Through Stevenage and Baldock, across the great open spaces to Royston, at sixty miles an hour to Newmarket, up the hill, along the Norwich road, then round to the left to Brandon, across the miles of heath with the stunted pine trees and miles of heather, into the more luxurious pastoral country of eastern Norfolk. It was half-past five when they crossed Fakenham Common and crept through the narrow streets of the old-fashioned town. He turned to look at her. She was still sleeping. She woke, however, as the car slackened speed.
'Where are we?' she asked.
'Fakenham,' he told her, 'with half-an-hour to spare. It's just half-past five.'
'You wonderful person,' she sighed, shaking herself free from the rugs.
They drew up in the archway 01 the hotel and made their way up the outside stairs into the old-fashioned coffee-room. She drank tea and toyed with her bread and butter absently. She looked continually out of the window, seawards.
'It is a wonderful day,' she said thoughtfully. 'There is no wind at all. They might come even before the time.'
He made her light a cigarette, followed her example, and in a few minutes they were again in the car. Half-an-hour later they looked down upon the quaint, old-world village of Blakeney, set amidst the marshlands, and beyond, the open sea. Suzanne was all alertness now and sat up by his side, gazing eagerly towards the line of white breakers. Suddenly, with a warning hoot, a long, grey car which had come up noiselessly behind them, swept past at a great speed. Suzanne gave a little exclamation.
'It is the car, I am sure!' she declared. 'It has come to meet him! All that I was told is true.'
'It's some car, all right,' Lavendale remarked, 'but I wouldn't have taken his dust as quietly as this if I'd heard him coming.'
She laughed at him.
'That car,' she said, 'is bound on the same errand that we are. It is on its way to Blakeney to meet the same passenger.'
'Well, we're in time, anyway,' was his only comment.
They slackened speed as they turned into the long, narrow street. About half-way down, the car in front of them was stopped by a soldier with drawn bayonet. A non-commissioned officer by the side was talking to the driver. Close at hand, a man in civilian clothes was lounging in front of what seemed to be the guardroom. Suzanne clutched her companion's arm in excitement.
'Ambrose!' she exclaimed. 'That's Major Elwell—the man in mufti, I mean! He is one of the chiefs of the English Secret Service.'
'I shall have to know a little more about this before I can catch on,' Lavendale confessed.
He brought his car slowly up behind the other one. The driver had raised his goggles and was seated in an impassive attitude whilst his license was being examined. Presently the little green book was returned to him and he moved slowly down the village street. Lavendale's license was inspected in the same fashion, after which they, too, followed down the village street, which terminated abruptly in a small dock, reached by an arm of the sea. Lavendale turned his car into the gateway of the inn, and together, a few moments later, they strolled down to the harbour. Only a thin stream of water covered the bottom of the estuary, scarcely enough to float a rowing boat, and one or two sailing barques were lying high and dry upon the mud. The stranger, who had drawn up his car by the side of the wall, was standing looking out seaward through a pair of field-glasses. Lavendale gazed across the marshes in the same direction, doubtfully.
'Say, you don't expect any ship that could cross the North Sea to come into dock here, do you?' he asked.
She nodded.
'Quite a large ship could come up at high tide,' she explained, 'but to-night they will not wait for the deep water. They will anchor outside and sail up in a smaller boat. Come for a walk a little way. That man is watching us.'
They strolled along a sandy lane, through a gate on the left opening on to the marshes. It was a grey and sombre evening, strangely still, colourless alike on sea and land and sky. A thin handful of cattle was stretched across the dyke-riven plain, a crowd of seagulls flapped their wings wearily overhead. Everywhere else an intense and almost mournful silence prevailed. Suzanne climbed to the top of one of the dykes and looked intently seaward.
'You see!' she exclaimed, pointing.
A small boat was anchored at the opening of the estuary. Beyond, almost on the horizon, was a thin line of smoke.
'They will not wait for the tide,' she told him, 'not the full tide, that is. They will come up as soon as that sailing boat can make the passage.'
'And who,' Lavendale inquired, 'will be the passenger?'
Her eyes flashed for a moment.
'He will be the man,' she said solemnly, 'who seeks to destroy France.' ...
They wandered a little way further out into the marshland. The air seemed to possess a peculiar saltiness—even in that slightly moving breeze they could feel the brackish taste upon their lips. They watched the tidal way grow deeper every minute. On either side of them the narrow dykes and curving waterways grew fuller and fuller with the tendrils of the sea. About a mile from the distant coast-line the steamer seemed to have come to an anchor, and the white-sailed boat was fluttering about her. Suzanne took Lavendale's arm. He could feel that she was trembling.
'Look here,' he begged, 'tell me a little more of what is going to happen?'
'Somebody will be landed from that steamer,' she said. 'They will come up here, get into the motor-car and start for London. That some one will be empowered to put certain propositions before the Russian Ambassador here, which he in his turn can convey to the Tsar in code. Those propositions will be for a peace which will exclude my country and yours, which will give Russia, temporarily defeated, the terms of a conquering nation.'
He laughed a little contemptuously.
'You don't need to worry, child,' he assured her. 'Russia isn't going to cave in yet awhile.'
'Not in any ordinary fashion,' she replied, 'but one lives in dread of some terrible disaster, and then—— These terms, they say, are to be left over for a month. Think of the temptation—all the fruits of victory offered in the very blackest moment of despair. Look!'
She pointed to the mouth of the river. The white-sailed boat was already commencing the passage of the estuary.
'Come,' she exclaimed, 'we must get back.'
They hurried across the marsh, finding their way with more difficulty now owing to the inward sweep of the tide, filling the narrow places with the soft swirl of salt-water. When they reached the raised path by the side of the estuary, the sailing boat was almost by their side. A man was seated in the stern, muffled up in an overcoat and wearing a tweed cap.
'There he is,' she murmured.
Lavendale glanced at the man in a puzzled fashion. Just at that moment the latter turned his head. He was dark, clean-shaven, and slightly built.
'Something rather familiar about him,' Lavendale muttered. 'You don't know his name?'
She shook her head.
'Wait,' she begged.
They reached the dock just as the boat was drawing up to the quay-side.
'Get out the car, please,' Suzanne directed, 'and drive slowly up the street, just past the guardroom. Wait there as though we had been stopped again.'
Lavendale obeyed. This time, as they drew up, Major Elwell leaned over the front of the car.
'He is here, I understand, Miss de Freyne,' he said softly. 'Are you going to stay? There may be a little trouble.'
She laughed derisively.
'This is Mr. Lavendale,' she whispered. 'He will take care of me, Major Elwell.'
The latter looked keenly at Lavendale and nodded.
'It's a queer piece of business, this,' he observed. 'Maybe our information is all wrong, after all.'
The other car came gliding up the village street and was brought to a standstill only a foot behind them. The driver addressed the sergeant almost angrily.
'I showed you my license a few minutes ago,' he protested. 'What's that other car doing ahead, blocking up the way?'
Lavendale drew slightly on one side. A soldier, with fixed bayonet, slipped into the little space between the two cars. Major Elwell turned towards the passenger.
'Sorry to trouble you, sir,' he said, 'but I must ask you to step inside the guardroom for a moment.'
'What do you want with me?' was the quick reply.
'You've landed from a steamer here, rather an exceptional thing to do anyway,' Major Elwell explained. 'There are just a few questions we should like to ask.'
'I'm an American citizen,' the other declared. 'I have my passport here. I can land where I choose.'
'In ordinary times, without a doubt,' the Major replied smoothly. 'Just now, I am sorry to be troublesome, but there are some new enactments which have to be considered. We shall have to ask you to give up anything you may have in the way of correspondence, for instance, to be censored.'
There was a moment's silence. The face of the man in the car had suddenly become tense. Lavendale, who had been looking around, gave a little start.
'Why, it's Johnson!' he exclaimed—'Leonard Johnson! You remember me, don't you—Lavendale?'
The man in the car nodded eagerly.
'Of course!' he assented. 'Look here, if you've any pull in these parts, I wish you'd persuade this officious gentleman to let me go on quickly. I'm in a hurry to reach London.'
'I'm afraid I can't,' Lavendale regretted. 'I'm hung up myself for some piffling reason. Where have you come from?'
'Holland,' was the brief reply.
'If you are really in a hurry, sir,' Major Elwell intervened politely,' you are only wasting time by this discussion with your friend. Before you proceed, you will have to come into the guardroom with me.'
'I'm damned if I do!' Mr. Johnson replied. 'If you lay hands on me, I'll report the whole affair at the Embassy directly I arrive in London. I'm well enough known there, and they'll tell you that I am in the American Embassy at Berlin.'
Lavendale shook his head gently.
'Not at the present moment, I think, Johnson,' he remarked. 'I'll answer for it, though, that you are a reputable American citizen.'
'My instructions are entirely independent of your nationality,' Major Elwell said firmly. 'I must trouble you to descend at once.'
There was scarcely a whisper, scarcely even a glance between the two men in the hindmost car. Action seemed to be entirely spontaneous. Their car, which had moved perhaps a foot or so back while they were talking, as though the brakes had failed to hold, was suddenly swung to the right. The front wing caught the soldier who was standing on guard, and the car, plunging forward with one wheel upon the pavement, threw him off his balance. He reeled back against the wall, and almost before they could realize what had happened, the car was tearing up the hill. The sergeant snatched a rifle from one of the men but Major Elwell stretched out his hand.
'We don't want that!' he exclaimed. 'Telephone at once to all the places en route to London, car number LC 3221. Can you make any sort of speed, Mr. Lavendale?'
'Jump in,' was the grim reply. 'You'll soon see.'
They dashed up the hill, travelling almost at the same speed as the other car. As they passed the church they saw it a speck in the distance, climbing the next hill. Lavendale slipped in his fourth speed.
'Thank God for the dust!' he muttered. 'We shall see which way they go. Hold on, Suzanne. We'll have to take risks.'
The air rushed past them. The finger of the spedometer crept up from thirty to fifty and sixty miles an hour. They swung round the corner, and through a tiny village, a cloud of dust rising behind, heedless of the curses shouted after them by the irate foot passengers.
'He's gone to the right,' Lavendale announced. 'That's Letheringsett. He'll leave the London road, though, if he can.'
'He'll try to give you the slip,' Major Elwell remarked, 'and take the train from somewhere.'
Lavendale smiled. The finger in front of them was still creeping upwards. They missed a hay wagon by a few inches. The pillar of dust in front of them grew nearer.
'We'll shepherd him into Fakenham,' Lavendale muttered. 'I could catch him now, if I wanted. They'll have had the message there, though.'
They skirted Letheringsett, up the hill, round corner after corner, through Thursford, with barely a hundred yards dividing them. Once, at some cross-roads, the car in front seemed to hesitate and they shot up to within fifty yards. The light now was becoming bad. There were little patches of shadow where the trees overhung the road.
'They're giving it up!' Lavendale exclaimed. 'By Jove, we've got them!'
He pointed forward. The road running into Fakenham narrowed. A line of three soldiers stood across the thoroughfare. With a grinding of brakes and ponderous swaying of the foremost car, the chase was over. Mr. Leonard Johnson descended, shaking the dust from his coat.
'Following me?' he asked Lavendale sarcastically.
Major Elwell's hand fell upon his shoulder.
'We're not meaning to lose sight of you again just yet, sir,' he said.
'You know what risk you run in interfering with an American citizen?' the other demanded.
'Perfectly,' Major Elwell replied.
'You don't, that's certain, or you wouldn't attempt it,' Johnson snapped. 'However, we can't talk in the street. I'll get into your car and go on to the inn with you.'
They drove on to the Crown Inn, mounted the outside staircase, Lavendale in front and Major Elwell bringing up the rear. The coffee-room was empty. They rang for refreshments and dismissed the waiter. Johnson threw back his overcoat.
'Now, let's have this out,' he began truculently, addressing Major Elwell. 'Who the mischief are you, and what do you mean by following me like this?'
'I am censor for the neighbourhood in which you landed from Holland, Mr. Johnson,' was the quiet reply. 'Your present position is entirely the result of your own injudicious behaviour.'
'What exactly do you want?' Johnson demanded.
'After your attempts to escape,' Major Elwell announced, 'I shall be compelled to search you.'
Johnson drew a revolver from his pocket. His manner remained bellicose.
'Look here,' he said, 'if you're looking for trouble you can have it. I don't recognize the right of anybody to interfere with my movements.'
Major Elwell strolled slowly across the room to where Johnson was standing, looking all the time down the muzzle of the outstretched revolver.
'One moment, Mr. Johnson,' he said. 'Do you mind glancing out of this window? No, you can keep your weapon—I've no designs on that. Just look down into the street.'
Johnson did as he was bidden. Half a dozen soldiers were lined up outside the entrance.
'Then out of the door, if you please,' the Major further suggested.
He held it open. At the bottom of the stairs a sentry was standing with drawn bayonet. Johnson stared at him for a moment. Then he turned abruptly away.
'Look here,' he said hoarsely, 'this censor business don't go with me. You're lying!'
'Perhaps so,' Major Elwell admitted smoothly, 'and so are you. You mentioned, I think, that you had been in the American Embassy at Berlin. You omitted to mention, however, that you have since joined the German Secret Service. As that fact is well-known to us, you can understand, I dare say, why we regard this landing of yours upon a lonely part of the coast with some—shall I say suspicion?'
Johnson stood very still for a moment. He seemed to be thinking deeply.
'This censorship of yours is a bluff, I suppose,' he muttered.
'Amongst many other positions,' Major Elwell admitted, 'I also hold a somewhat important place in the English Secret Service. You have, I trust, one of the first qualifications for useful service in your profession—you are able to recognize the inevitable? You are face to face with it now.'
There was a brief silence. Johnson was standing at the window with his hands behind him. Presently he turned around.
'Very well,' he pronounced curtly, 'you've got me fairly enough. Go ahead.'
'You see,' Major Elwell explained, 'you might, under the present laws, be treated as an ordinary indiscreet traveller—or as a spy. Better hand over everything you are carrying.'
Johnson opened his coat pocket and threw a few letters and a pocket-book upon the table. Major Elwell glanced them through and sighed. Then he turned towards Suzanne.
'If you would give us a couple of minutes, please,' he begged.
Lavendale led her out into the yard. In a few minutes the door behind them was thrown open. The Major was standing at the top of the steps.
'Where's the car?' he shouted—'the car they came in?'
Lavendale looked down the yard and dashed into the street.
'Where's the other car?' he asked one of the soldiers on guard.
'No instructions to detain it, sir,' the man replied. 'The chauffeur drove it to the garage to fill up with petrol.'
They ran across the street in a little procession. The man in charge of the place stared at them, a little dazed.
'Car came in about ten minutes ago—a great Delauney-Belleville,' he informed them. 'She filled up and started off for London.'
Major Elwell turned towards Lavendale and laughed hardly.
'That fellow's first job, he muttered, 'and he's done us in! The documents he was carrying are in that car!'
*****
Major Elwell spent the next hour in the telegraph office whilst Lavendale and Suzanne raced southwards. More than once they had news of the car of which they were in pursuit. At Brandon it was only twenty minutes ahead, and at Newmarket they learnt that the driver had called at the station, found there was no train for an hour and continued his journey. From Newmarket, through Six-Mile-Bottom and onwards, they touched seventy miles an hour, and even Suzanne shivered a little in her seat. At the Royston turn the sparks flew upwards through the grey light as Lavendale's brakes bit their way home.
'Two ways to London here,' he muttered. 'Wait.'
He took a little electric torch from his pocket and stooped down in the road. In less than a dozen seconds he was back in the driving seat.
'By Royston,' he whispered. 'I fancy, somehow, we are gaining on him.'
They tore onwards along the narrow but lonelier road. Once, on a distant hillside far in front, they caught the flash of a light. Lavendale gave a little whoop of triumph.
'We shall get him,' he cried fiercely. 'We've twenty miles of road like this to Royston.'
The excitement of the chase began to tell on both of them. Suzanne, sitting close to the side of the car, leaned a little forward, her eyes bright, her hair wind-tossed, her cheeks flushed, breathless all the time with the lashing of their speed-made wind. Lavendale sat like a figure of wood, leaning a little over his wheel, his hands rigid, his whole frame tense with the strain. Once more they saw the light, this time a little nearer. Then they skidded crossing an unexpected railway track, took a few seconds to right themselves, and the light shot ahead. They passed through Royston and shot up the hill, scarcely slackening speed. It was a little before moonlight now, and the heath stretching away on their left seemed like some silent and frozen sea on which the mists rested lightly. Suddenly a little cry broke from Lavendale's lips, his foot crushed down upon the brakes. In front of them, by the side of the road, was the other car, disabled, its left wheel missing, the driving seat empty. They came to a standstill within a few feet of it and Lavendale leapt lightly out. Lying with his head upon the grass was the driver. Lavendale bent rapidly over him.
'The front wheel must have shot off and pitched him forward,' he explained to Suzanne. 'I'm afraid he is hurt. You'd better go and sit in the car.'
Then the woman he had seen nothing of blazed out from the girl by his side.
'Do not be foolish,' she cried fiercely. 'He is alive, is he not? Quick! Search him!'
Lavendale for a moment was staggered. He was feeling for the man's heart.
'What is the life or death of such as he!' she continued, almost savagely. 'Search him, I say!'
Lavendale obeyed her, a little dazed. There was a license, a newspaper of that morning's date, a few garage receipts for petrol, a handkerchief, a penknife and a large cigarette case—not another thing. She pushed him on one side while she felt his body carefully. The man opened his eyes, groaning.
'My leg!' he muttered.
Lavendale stood up.
'I think that's all that's the matter with him,' he pronounced—'fracture of the leg. We'd better take him back to the hospital.'
'Leave him alone,' she ordered. 'Come here with me at once.'
Lavendale obeyed mutely. She sprang up into the dismantled car and began feeling the cushions.
'Look in the pockets,' she directed.
Lavendale turned them inside out. There were maps, a contour book, an automobile handbook, more garage receipts, an odd glove—nothing of interest. Suddenly Suzanne gave a little cry. She bent closer over the driving cushion, pulled at a little hidden tab, opened it. There reposed a letter in a thick white envelope, the letter of their quest. Lavendale flashed his electric torch upon it. It was addressed in plain characters:—
To His Excellency.
He thrust it into his pocket.
'Look here,' he insisted, 'we've found what we want. We must see about that man now.'
They lifted him into their car and drove him back to the hospital. Lavendale left money, called at the police-station and gave information about the accident. Then they ran up to the hotel and stood side by side for a moment in the dimly-lit, stuffy coffee-room. He drew the letter from his pocket.
'Well?' he asked.
She glanced at the seal—huge and resplendent.
'It is only the first part of our task that is done,' she sighed, 'yet everything is ready for the second. That letter will be delivered. It is the answer we want.'
She took the letter and placed it in the small bag she was carrying.
'Some sandwiches, please,' she begged, 'and then London.'
*****
Twenty-four hours later they sat in her little sitting-room. Suzanne was restless and kept glancing at the clock, lighting cigarettes and throwing them away. Often she glanced at Lavendale, imperturbable, a little troubled.
'Why do you frown?' she demanded.
'I don't know,' he answered simply. 'This business has its dark side, you know. I was thinking of it from your point of view. You are going to open a friend's letter—that's what it comes to. You're on fire to see whether your friend, whom you should trust, is as honourable as you think him. It leaves an unpleasant flavour, you know.'
She came to a standstill before him.
'My friend,' she said, 'you have something yet to learn in our profession. It is this—honour and joy, conduct itself, idealism, all those things that make up the mesh of life, lose their significance to the man or woman who works for his country as I have done, as you have commenced to do. I am for France alone, and for France's sake I have no character. For France's sake I have sent a dummy messenger to the Prince. For France's sake I shall open the reply. It may tell me everything, it may tell me nothing, but one must be warned.'
There was a ring at the bell. A young man entered, closing the door behind him. Suzanne almost sprang towards him.
'You have the answer?' she cried.
The messenger bowed. Suzanne was suddenly calm. She tore open the long, thick envelope with trembling fingers. She peered inside for a moment, doubtfully. Then her whole face relaxed, her eyes flashed with joy. She held the envelope up over the table. A little stream of torn pieces of paper fell from it. Her eyes were moist as she watched them.
'It is the offer of our enemy,' she cried, 'and the answer of our ally! Some scraps of paper!'
Lavendale drew a deep sigh of content as he withdrew his eyes reluctantly from the glittering phantasmagoria of the city, stretching away below like a fire-spangled carpet. He leaned back in his chair and raised his glass to his lips.
'No doubt about my being an American born, Moreton,' he observed. 'The first night in New York is always a real home-coming to me. And this is New York, isn't it?' he went on, musingly, 'city of steel and iron, typical, indescribable.'
Jim Moreton, an erstwhile college friend and now a prosperous lawyer, nodded sympathetically.
'We are right in the heart of things here,' he assented. 'Nothing like a roof garden round about Broadway, to see us at home. I wonder whether you noticed any change?' he went on. 'They tell us that we get more European every year in our love of pleasure and luxury.'
Lavendale glanced around at the many little groups dining on the twenty-eighth storey of a famous hotel, under the light of the big, yellow moon. The table illuminations, and the row of electric lights which ran along the parapet, seemed strangely insignificant. Everywhere was a loud murmur of conversation, punctuated by much feminine laughter, the incessant popping of corks, the music of the not too insistent band.
'I tell you, Jimmy,' he confided, leaning forward towards his friend, 'to look into the faces of these people is the greatest relief I have known for twelve months. Just at first, when war broke out, one didn't notice much change, in England especially, but latterly there has been no mistaking it. Wherever you went, in the streets or the restaurants, you could see the writing in the faces of the people, a sort of dumb repression of feeling, just as though they were trying to get through the task of every-day life because they had to, eating and drinking because they had to, talking, amusing themselves, even, with an absent feverishness all the time—unnatural. I tell you it's like being in some sort of a dream to be in London or Paris to-day. It's only to-night I've felt myself back amongst real men and women again, and it's good.'
Moreton nodded understandingly.
'A fellow was writing something of the sort in one of the Sunday papers last week,' he remarked. 'Over here, of course, the whole thing to us is simply pictorial. We don't realize or appreciate what is happening. We can't.'
'And yet some day,' Lavendale sighed, 'we shall have to go through it ourselves.'
'One of your Harvard theories cropping up again!'
'It's more than a theory now—it's a certainty,' Lavendale insisted. 'One doesn't need to brood, though. There's plenty of real life buzzing around us all the time. Do you know why I sent you that wireless, Jim?'
'Not an idea on earth,' the other admitted. 'I guess I was conceited enough to hope that you wanted to see me again.'
'That's so, anyway,' Lavendale assured him, 'and you know it, but apart from that I want you to do something for me. I want to meet your uncle.'
'I'll do what I can,' Moreton promised, a little dubiously. 'He isn't the easiest person to get at, as you know.'
'Where is he now?' Lavendale inquired.
'I haven't had a line from him or my aunt for months,' Moreton replied, 'but the papers say he is coming to New York to-night.'
'Is there anything in these sensational reports about his new discovery?' Lavendale asked eagerly.
'I shouldn't be surprised,' the other confessed. 'There is no doubt that he is giving up his laboratories and closing down in the country. He told me himself, last time I saw him, that the thing he'd been working at, off and on, for the last thirty years, was in his hands at last, perfect. He's through with inventing—that's how he put it to me. He is going to spend the rest of his days reading dime novels in the mornings and visiting cinemas in the afternoons—says his brain's tired.'
'I shouldn't wonder at that,' Lavendale observed. 'He was seventy-two last year, wasn't he? I wonder how long he'll keep his word, though.'
'He seems in earnest. He has been very cranky lately, and they were all terrified down at Lakeside that he'd blow the whole place up.'
'You don't know any particulars about this last invention, I suppose?'
'If I did,' Moreton declared with a little laugh, 'I could have had my weight in dollars from the newspaper men alone. No, I know nothing whatever about it. All I can promise is that I'll take you up to Riverside Drive and do my best to boost you in. Now tell me what you've been doing with yourself this year, Ambrose? You've left the Diplomatic Service, haven't you?'
'Not altogether. I have a sort of unofficial position at the Embassy, perhaps as important as my last one, only not quite so prominent.'
'Still as great a scaremonger as ever? Do you remember those discussions you used to start at the debating society?'
'I remember them all right,' Lavendale assented grimly, 'and since you ask me the question, let me tell you this, Jim. I've lived, as you know, during the last seven years in the diplomatic atmosphere of Paris, of London and Berlin. I tell you soberly that anything I felt and believed in those days, I feel and believe twice as strongly to-day. Just look over your left shoulder, Jimmy. Isn't that rather a queer-looking couple for a fashionable roof-garden!'
Moreton turned a little lazily around. An elderly man and woman who had just entered were being shown to an adjacent table. The man was apparently of some seventy years of age, his morning clothes were of old-fashioned cut and he wore only a little wisp of black tie. His grey beard was cut in the fashion of a century ago, his bushy hair was long and unkempt. His companion, who seemed but a few years younger, wore the simplest of dark travelling clothes, some jet jewellery, a huge cameo brooch fastened a shawl at her throat and she carried a leather handbag.
'Don't they look as though they'd come out of the ark!' Lavendale murmured.
Moreton had risen slowly to his feet.
'Queer thing that you should spot them, Ambrose,' he remarked. 'This is what you might call something of a coincidence.'
'You don't mean to say that you know them?'
Jim Moreton nodded.
'My Uncle Ned and my Aunt Bessie,' he said. 'I must go and speak to them.'
He crossed towards the elderly couple, shook hands with the man, who greeted him cordially enough, and submitted to an embrace from the lady. Lavendale could hear, every now and then, scraps of their conversation. Towards its close, his friend turned and beckoned to him. Lavendale, who had been eagerly awaiting a summons, rose at once and approached the trio.
'Aunt,' Moreton explained, laying his hand upon his friend's shoulder, 'this is Mr. Ambrose Lavendale, a graduate of my year at Harvard. Uncle, Lavendale has just returned from Europe and he was talking to me about you. He is like the rest of us, tremendously interested in what all the world is saying about you and your latest discovery.'
Lavendale shook hands with the elderly couple, who greeted him kindly.
'Discovery, eh?' Mr. Moreton observed jocularly.
'That does seem rather an inadequate word,' Lavendale admitted. 'I think one of your own newspapers here declared that you had learnt how to bottle up the lightnings, to——'
'Oh, those damned papers!' Mr. Moreton exclaimed irritably. 'Don't talk to me about them, young fellow.'
'I would much rather talk to you about what they are aiming at,' Lavendale said simply. 'Are you going to give any demonstration, sir—I mean, of course, to the scientific world?'
The inventor glanced up at his questioner with a little twinkle in his hard, blue eyes.
'Say, you've some nerve, young fellow!' he declared amiably. 'However, I am very fond of my nephew here, and if you're a friend of Jim's you shall be one of a very select company to-morrow morning. The scientific world can wait, but I am going to set the minds of the newspaper people at rest. I am going to show them what I can do. I was thinking of asking you, any way, Jim,' he went on, 'and you can bring your friend with you. Twelve o'clock at Riverside Drive.'
The two young men were both profuse in their thanks. Mr. Moreton waved them away. 'There will be just three or four newspaper men,' he continued—'I put the names of the principal papers into a bottle and drew lots; the reporters who came down to Jersey State agreed to that—you two, your aunt and a young lady. You can go and finish your dinner now, boys. Your aunt and I, Jim, are going on to a cinema afterwards. We're going to make a real night of it.'
The two young men shook hands and made their adieux. As soon as they had resumed their places, Lavendale leaned across the table towards his friend with glowing face.
'Jimmy, you're a brick,' he declared. 'We'll have another bottle on the strength of this. The very night I arrive, too! Whoever heard of such luck! I don't suppose I should ever have got within a hundred yards of him but for you.'
'He's a shy old bird,' Moreton admitted. 'We certainly were in luck to-night though.'
'I wonder who the girl is who's going to be there,' Lavendale remarked idly.
His eyes had suddenly strayed once more over the brilliant yet uneasy panorama of flashing lights, huge buildings, the throbbing and clanging of cars across the distant line of the river to the blue spaces beyond. The leader of the little orchestra behind was playing a familiar waltz. Suzanne and he had danced it together one night in London. He was for a moment oblivious of the whole gamut of his surroundings. The world closed in upon him. He heard her voice, felt the touch of her fingers, saw a gleam of the tenderness which sometimes flashed out from beneath the suffering of her eyes. His friend glanced at him in wonder. It was the insistent voice of a waiter which brought him back from his reverie.
'French or Turkish coffee, sir?'
Lavendale made a heedless choice and climbed down to the present.
'Way back somewhere, weren't you?' Jim Moreton remarked.
His friend nodded.
'I have left behind a great deal that one remembers.'
*****
At a few minutes before twelve on the following morning, Lavendale and his friend were conducted by a coloured butler across a very magnificent entrance hall of black and white marble, strewn with wonderful rugs, through several suites of reception rooms, and out on to a broad stone piazza, at the back of Mr. Moreton's mansion in Riverside Drive. It was here that Lavendale received one of the surprises of his life. Mr. and Mrs. Moreton were reclining in low wicker chairs, and between them, a miracle of daintiness in her white linen costume and plain black hat, was—Suzanne. Lavendale forget his manners, forgot the tremendous interest of his visit, forgot everything else in the world. He stood quite still for a moment. Then he strode forward with outstretched hands and a very visible gladness in his face.
'Suzanne!' he exclaimed. 'Why, how wonderful!'
She laughed at him gaily as she accepted his greeting. There was some response to his joy shining out of her eyes, but it was obvious that his presence was less of a surprise to her.
'You did not know that I was here?' she asked. 'But why not? Men and women have travelled many times round the world before now to learn its secrets.'
Lavendale recovered a little of his self-possession. He shook hands with Mrs. Moreton, who was beaming placidly upon them, mutely approving of this unexpected romance. The great inventor turned him round by the shoulder and indicated four men of varying ages who formed the rest of the little company.
'I will not introduce you by name,' he said, 'but these four gentlemen, selected by lot, as I think I told you last night, represent the mightiest and holiest power on earth—the great, never-to-be-denied Press of America. They are here because, since the first rumour stole from my laboratory down in Jersey State that I had reached the end of my labours, I have been the victim of an incessant and turbulent siege, carried on relentlessly day by day—I might almost say hour by hour. For good reasons I desired to keep my discovery to myself a little longer, but I know that I am beaten, and these gentlemen, or rather the power which they represent, have been too many for me. My country household has been honeycombed with spies. My medical man, my gardener, the assistants in my laboratory, have every one of them been made the objects of subtle and repeated attempts at bribery. Young Mr. Lavendale, let me tell you this—the Press of America to-day is the one undeniable force. Look at them—my conquerors. I am going to present them to-day with my secret—not willingly, mind, but because, if I do not yield, they will continue to eat with me, to sleep with me and to walk with me, to plague my days and curse my nights. This young lady,' he continued, in an altered tone, 'came to me with a personal letter from my cousin, our Ambassador in Paris. You, Mr. Lavendale, are here as my nephew's friend. Now, if you are ready, I will proceed with the demonstration.'
The four men had risen to their feet. One of them, a well-set-up, handsome young fellow, shook hands with Lavendale.
'I was a year before you at Harvard, wasn't I?' he remarked. 'We think that Mr. Moreton is just a little hard upon us. We represent, to use his own words, the undeniable force, and to do it we have to forget that we are human, and persist. This may be very annoying to Mr. Moreton, but as a rule it is the world that benefits.'
The inventor, who had disappeared for a moment in the interior of the room which led out on to the piazza, suddenly stood upon the threshold. His face seemed to have become graver during the last few moments and he motioned them impatiently back to their places. Then, with a reel of what seemed to be fine wire in his hand, he made his way to the further end of the broad balcony which completely encircled the house, and carefully stretched a length of the wire from the edge of the building to the stone balustrade. As soon as he had accomplished this, he drew from his pockets what appeared to be a pair of black gloves of some spongy material, and a tiny instrument about the size of a lady's watch, which none of them could see. He drew on the gloves with great care, placed the instrument between the palms of his hands and turned to his nephew.
'Just ring the bell there, will you, Jimmy?' he directed.
The young man obeyed. The little group now were all standing up, their eyes fixed upon that strip of thin wire. Mr. Moreton slowly drew his palms together several times, pausing once to glance at the small instrument which lay concealed between them. Footsteps were heard approaching around the side of the house, and a coloured servant in livery, carrying a tray in his hand, appeared. He had no sooner set his foot upon the wire than he stopped short, gave a wild jump into the air, came down again, jumped again, and slowly, with the salver still in his hand, began to dance.
'Touch the bell,' the inventor ordered, in a voice which seemed tense with suppressed emotion.
His nephew obeyed at once and again there were footsteps. Another servant, carrying a chair, came round the corner, paused for a moment as though in amazement on perceiving the antics of his predecessor, stepped on to the wire, leapt into the air, and commenced to perform almost similar gyrations. Mr. Moreton's breath was coming fast and he seemed to be the victim of some peculiar emotion. This time he only glanced towards the bell, which his nephew pushed. Again there were footsteps. A third servant, with a box of cigars, appeared, gave a little exclamation at the extraordinary sight before him, stepped forward on to the wire, leapt up till his head almost touched the sloping portico, and commenced throwing the cigars into the air and catching them. Mr. Moreton glanced from the three performers towards his little audience. The expression on their faces was absolutely indescribable. Meanwhile, the dancing of the three men in livery became more rapid. The man with the salver and glasses began throwing them into the air and catching them again, the servant on the outside was now occupied in balancing a cigar on the tip of his nose, while his neighbour on the right was twirling the wicker chair which he had been carrying, on the point of his forefinger. Mr. Moreton stretched out his hand towards the spellbound, stupefied little company.
'The Hamlin Trio, gentlemen, of jugglers and dancers, imported from the Winter Gardens at great expense for your entertainment! Good morning!'
With one bound he was through the window. They heard the bolt slipped into its place. From behind the glass he turned and waved his hand to the newspaper men. Then he disappeared.
'Spoofed, my God!' the journalist who had spoken to Lavendale, exclaimed.
For a single moment they all looked at one another. The trio of entertainers were redoubling now their efforts. There was a roar of laughter.
'The joke's on us,' one of the other newspaper men admitted candidly, 'but what a story! We'd better get along and write it, you fellows,' he added, 'before they have it up against us.'
'Is there any chance,' a third man inquired, 'of Mr. Moreton talking to us reasonably?'
His wife beamed placidly upon them.
'Not one chance in this life,' she assured them. 'If you knew the language poor dear Ned has used about you gentlemen of the Press worrying him down at Lakeside during the last few months, you'd only wonder that he has let you off so lightly.'
'Then perhaps,' Lavendale's acquaintance suggested, 'we'd better be getting along.'
The Hamlin Trio, at the other end of the piazza, suddenly ceased their labours, made a collective bow and disappeared. The newspaper men still lingered, looking longingly at the bolted window. Mrs. Moreton shook her head.
'Just leave him alone for a little time,' she begged. 'He has got a down on you newspaper gentlemen, and the way they worried him down at New Jersey has pretty well driven him crazy. Don't try him any more this morning, if you please,' she persisted. 'It's my belief this little joke he's played on you kept him out of the hospital.'
The silvery-haired old lady, with her earnest eyes and the little quaver in her tone, triumphed. The little company reluctantly dispersed. Lavendale and Suzanne were on the point of following the others when a head was thrust cautiously out of a window on the second storey of the house.
'Has the Press of the United States departed?' Mr. Moreton inquired.
'They've all gone, dear,' his wife called out soothingly.
'Then bring the others in to luncheon,' Mr. Moreton invited.
'I'll bring them in right away,' Mrs. Moreton promised. 'Say, that's a good sign, young people,' she added, turning to them cheerfully. 'He has hated the sight of company lately, but I did feel real uncomfortable at sending you away without any offer of hospitality. He has locked this window fast enough,' she added, trying it, 'but come right along with me and I'll show you another way in.'
They followed her along the piazza. Lavendale and Suzanne fell a little way behind. It was their first opportunity.
'How long have you been here?' he asked eagerly. 'What did you come for? Why didn't you let me know?'
'I have been in New York four days,' she told him. 'I was on theCity of Paris. We passed you near Queenstown. As for the rest, I suppose I am here for the same reason that you are. Monsieur Senn, the great electrician, has been working on the same lines as Moreton for years, and he persuaded me to get a letter from the American Ambassador in Paris and come out here. I do not suppose, though, that it is any use. They say that Mr. Moreton is like you—American inventions for the American people.'
'I've wobbled once or twice,' he reminded her.
'Of course, there's always a chance,' she murmured.
'Say that you are glad to see me?' he begged.
She gave his hand a little squeeze. Then Mrs. Moreton turned round with a motherly smile.
'If you'll take your cocktail in the smoking-room with Jimmy, Mr. Lavendale,' she said, 'I'll look after Miss de Freyne.' ...
Luncheon was a meal of unexpected simplicity, served by a couple of trim waiting-maids in a magnificent apartment which overlooked the Hudson. Mr. Moreton was in high good-humour over his latest exploit, and they all indulged in speculations as to the nature of the stories which would appear in the evening editions. Underneath his hilarity, however, Lavendale more than once fancied that he noted signs of an immense tension. Sometimes, in the middle of a conversation, the great inventor would break off as though he had lost the thread of what he had been saying, and look uneasily, almost supplicatingly around him until some one supplied him with the context of his speech. Towards the end of the meal, after a brief silence, he turned with curious abruptness towards Lavendale.
'Say, you've come a long way to see nothing, young man,' he remarked.
'I have had the pleasure of meeting you, sir,' Lavendale replied politely, 'and, after all, I never believed the things they were saying in London.'
'What were they saying?' Mr. Moreton demanded brusquely.
'There was a report there when I left,' Lavendale answered, 'that you had learnt at last the secret of handling electricity by wireless, handling it, I mean, in destructive fashion.'
'Oh! they said that, did they?' Mr. Moreton observed, smiling to himself.
'To be absolutely exact,' Lavendale went on, 'they said that you had professed to discover it. A great scientific man whom I met only a few days before I left England, however—Sir Hubert Bowden—assured me that mine would be a wasted journey because the thing was impossible.'
A suddenly changed man sat in Mr. Moreton's place. The unhealthy pallor of his skin was disfigured by dark red, almost purple patches. His eyes were like glittering beads. He struck the table fiercely with his hairy fist.
'Bowden is an ass!' he exclaimed. 'He is an ignorant numskull, a dabbler, a blind follower in other men's footsteps. Impossible to me—Moreton?'
'My dear! My dear!' his wife murmured anxiously from the other end of the table.
The inventor turned to one of the servants.
'Telephone to the garage for the car to be here in ten minutes,' he ordered. 'I have had my little joke,' he went on, as the girl left the room. 'This afternoon we'll get to business.'
His fury seemed to pass away as suddenly as it had come. He ate and drank nervously but with apparent appetite. As soon as the meal was over he commenced smoking a black cigar, and, excusing himself rather abruptly, left the room.
'Do you suppose,' Lavendale asked his hostess, 'that he is really going to give us a demonstration?'
'I don't know,' she answered uneasily. 'I wish I could get him somewhere right away from every one who talks about inventions and electricity. You put his back up, you know, Mr. Lavendale. He was quite all right before you handed him that sort of challenge.'
'I am sorry,' Lavendale murmured mendaciously.
In a few minutes they received an urgent summons. They found Mr. Moreton waiting in a large, open car below. He had quite recovered his temper. His face, indeed, shone with the benign expression of a child on its way to a treat.
'Miss de Freyne and Mr. Lavendale, you can sit by my side,' he ordered. 'Jimmy, you get up in front. The man knows where to go.'
They swung round and in a few minutes turned into Central Park. At a spot where the road curved rather abruptly, the car came to a standstill. Mr. Moreton stepped out. From his pocket he drew a small skein of what seemed to be white silk, and a tiny instrument with a dial face and perforated with several holes.
'Hold that,' he directed Lavendale.
The latter obeyed. Mr. Moreton drew the thread of white silk backwards and forwards through one of the apertures in the instrument, the finger on the dial face mounting all the time from zero. When it reached a certain figure he drew it out, and, stooping down, stretched it across the path from the hedge to the curbstone. Then he glanced up and down and around the corner. The park was almost deserted and there were only a few loungers in sight. From the small bag which he had brought with him in the car, Mr. Moreton next produced a square black box with a handle in the side, and a pair of black indiarubber gloves which he hastily donned. Then, with the box in his hand, he turned the handle which protruded from its side. A queer, buzzing little sound came from the interior, a sound which, low though it was, thrilled Lavendale from its utter and mysterious novelty. It was a sound such as he had never imagined, a sound like the grumblings of belittled and imprisoned thunder. The finger on the dial moved slowly. When it had reached a certain point, Mr. Moreton paused. He clasped the machine tightly in his hands. The mutterings still continued, and from a tiny opening underneath came little flashes of blue fire. The inventor stepped into the car, motioning the others to follow him, and gave an order to the driver. They backed to a spot by the side of the road, about a hundred yards away from where the thread of white silk lay stretched across the pavement. Mr. Moreton gripped the instrument in his rubber-clad hand and leaned back in the car, his eyes fixed upon the corner. His expression had become calmer, almost seraphic.
'We shall see now,' he promised them, smiling, 'another land of dance. There is only one thing I should like to point out. The little instrument I hold in my hand now is adjusted to any distance up to two hundred yards. By turning the handle a dozen more times, the distance could be increased to a mile, and more in proportion. The length of my silk-covered wire is immaterial. It could stretch, if desired, from here to Broadway. Now watch.'
They all sat with their eyes fastened upon the corner of the pathway. A slight uneasiness which Lavendale in particular had felt, was almost banished by a thrilling sense of expectancy. Suddenly a portly figure appeared, a policeman whom they had passed soon after entering the park. He approached with his hands behind him, walking in ruminating fashion. Suddenly, as his foot touched the thread, he came to a halt. There was something unnatural in his momentarily statuesque attitude. Then, before their eyes he seemed to stiffen, fell like a log on his right side, with his head in the roadway. His helmet rolled a few feet away. The man remained motionless. Lavendale sprang to his feet but Mr. Moreton pushed him back.
'That is of no consequence,' he said softly. 'Wait for a moment.'
Lavendale even then would have obeyed his instinct and jumped from the car, but his limbs seemed powerless. A man and a girl, arm in arm, appeared round the corner. Suzanne stood up. A strange, hysterical impulse seized her and she tried to shout. Her voice sounded like the feeblest whimper. The two lovers, as their feet touched the thread, seemed suddenly to break off in their conversation. It was as though the words themselves were arrested upon their lips, as though all feeling and movement had become paralyzed. Then they, too, stiffened and fell in the same direction. A park-keeper, who had seen the collapse of the policeman, came running across the road, shouting all the time, and an automobile which had been crawling along, increased its speed and raced to the spot. Mr. Moreton touched a button in the instrument which he was holding. The thunder died away and the blue flashes ceased. Suzanne leaned back in the car; her cheeks were as pale as death. Lavendale bent over her.
'It's all right, Suzanne,' he assured her. 'Sit here while I go down. There is nothing wrong with those people really. It's just another of Mr. Moreton's little jokes.'
Nevertheless, when Lavendale's feet touched the ground he gave a little cry, for the earth seemed quaking around him. Mr. Moreton, who was walking by his side, patted him on the shoulder.
'Steady, my boy! Steady!' he said. 'You see, the whole of the earth between here and that little thread of white silk is heavily charged. You feel, don't you, as though the ground were rising up and were going to hit you in the chin. I've grown used to it. There goes poor Jimmy. Dear me, he hasn't the nerve of a chicken!'
Young Moreton fell over in a dead faint. Lavendale set his teeth and staggered on. A little crowd was already gathering around the three prostrate bodies as they drew near.
'You see,' Mr. Moreton explained reassuringly, 'I have broken the connection now. Nothing more will happen.'
'What of those three—the policeman, the man and the girl?' Lavendale faltered.
Mr. Moreton patted him on the back. They had reached now the outskirts of the little group.
'Theirs,' he said gravely, 'was the real dance. You have been fortunate, young man. Your journey from Europe has been worth while, after all. You have seen the Hamlin Trio in their Jugglers' Dance, and you have seen here in the sunshine, under the green trees, with all the dramatic environment possible, the greatest dance of all—the dance of death.'
Lavendale felt the blood once more flowing freely in his veins. He turned almost fiercely upon his companion as he pushed his way through the gathering crowd.
'You don't mean that they are really dead?' he cried.
'Even your wonderful friend Bowden,' Mr. Moreton assured him sweetly, 'could never wake a single beat in their hearts again.'
An ambulance had just glided up. A man who seemed to be a doctor rose to his feet, shaking the dust from his knees.
'These three people are dead,' he pronounced sombrely. 'The symptoms are inexplicable.'
He suddenly recognized Moreton, who held out his hand genially towards him.