"It was two years ago," began Blagden, "on the beach at Trouville. I shall never forget it. The sea and the sky were blue; the sands were silver; and you were a marvelous mermaid, in gold and crimson, basking on the shore. When I saw you, I felt such emotion that I began at once repeating whole stanzas of Swinburne, appropriate to the occasion, and rivalling the day in warmth. I hoped--"
But she interrupted him. "It is pathetic," she said, "that a memory so tenderly poetical should be so much at fault. I am grieved for myself; I thought I had made a more lasting impression."
"But my memory," he protested, "is not at fault. I remember perfectly. It was a wonderful costume, almost worthy of its wearer. It was gold, pale gold--"
"Oh, stupid man!" she cried, "we are not talking of costumes; what do they matter? We are talking of our first meeting, and that was not at Trouville at all. Trouville, although delightful, came later. Our first meeting was at the races--"
"By Jove," he ejaculated, "you're right. So it was--Deauville races. And you were in the grandstand, in the very first row--"
"That's better," she exclaimed. "Your memory is improving. I was watching the horses parade before the opening race, and was suddenly smitten with the charms of a beautiful bay namedVoyageur. Immediately I knew that I must bet five hundred francs onVoyageur. The time was short--"
"And so," he smiled, "you made appealing eyes at me--"
"No, no," she contradicted, "I did not. Or if I did, I was quite justified. You had been staring at me very rudely for some time."
"That is true," he admitted. "I couldn't help myself. But in any event, we became acquainted, and I placed the money on your favorite. I recall that distinctly. And I remember thinking, 'Poor girl; poor lovely girl; she will surely lose.' And thenVoyageur--"
She in her turn took up the tale. "Oh, wasn't it splendid?" she cried. "A furlong from home, and we thought that he was beaten, and then, like a flash, up he came, out of the ruck, past the leaders, won under wraps, with his jockey sitting still, and both of us shrieking, 'Voyageur!Voyageur!' like mad."
"It was glorious," he agreed. "And after that do you remember the race for two-year-olds, and my theory that in an untried field the odds were all against the favorites winning? I suggested that we buy a ticket on every horse in the race; you assented, and the theory proved a magnificent success. We won a thousand francs--"
"And that night," she reminded him, "flushed with victory, we played roulette. It was I who invented the system then, and unlike yours, it cost us every cent we had made, and much more besides. Do you remember that?"
"Of course I do," he answered. "It was the old story; we were winners, but didn't know when to stop. But it was worth it; those were royal days."
"And then," she continued, "came our ventures in the market. The rise in rails that made us rich; and the cotton corner that beggared us. You haven't forgotten those?"
"Forgotten them?" he echoed. "Could I forget? Ah! what times those were!"
There was a pause. At length she said musingly, "Two years ago. Two long years. And how has Fortune treated you? Bountifully, I hope."
Blagden smiled. "I was just complaining to my friends," he said, "that she had deserted me. And now--she resumes her favors."
She bowed, half in earnest, half jestingly. "You are too kind," she answered, "but seriously, I am sorry if you have not prospered."
"To be candid," Blagden admitted, "I have not. But I am not discouraged. Being a Goddess, it is her privilege to be fickle; that, I suppose, is her real fascination. But tell me how the years have gone with you. Have you lived as you planned to live?"
She regarded him steadily, and without emotion. "Exactly," she answered, "as I planned."
He was silent, returning her gaze. "Well," he rejoined at length, "if it is a matter for congratulation, then I congratulate you. Is he rich?"
"Oh, very," she responded. "You need hardly have asked me that?"
"Quite true," he answered. "Forgive my stupidity. And are you happy?"
"Why--yes," she replied more doubtfully, "I suppose so. I have a great deal. I desire more."
"That," he said, "is the chief trouble with all of us. That, in fact, was the reason for my recent undoing. I risked a moderate capital to gain a fortune, and was wiped out. I lost everything--hook, line and sinker."
"I am so sorry," she answered. "Was it in stocks?"
"Next door to it," he responded. "It was January cotton. By every test in the world, by reasoning, by statistical information, by the opinion of the trade, by the advice of brokers, by every known method of determining values, January cotton was the greatest purchase in the universe. It had to go up, that was all there was to it. It was mathematically impossible for it to stay down. So I bought it, bought it up to my eyebrows; and so, I imagine, did every Tom, Dick and Harry in the Street. Result, a hundred and fifty point drop, swift and sudden as a hurricane, and when it was over, scattered heaps of financial corpses, of which I had the honor to be one. I had money, desired more; and got--what I deserved."
She sighed sympathetically. "I only wish," she murmured, more to herself than to him, "that I had known."
He regarded her with frank amazement. "What could you have done?" he queried. "Prevented me from losing?"
"Yes," she answered gravely, "I think that I could. I, of course, know nothing, but it happens that my friend is a great authority upon the markets. He is never wrong."
Blagden smiled indulgently. "Oh, I've heard of those fellows," he responded. "Don't think I'm rude, but there's no such thing in the world as a man who's never wrong on speculation. He simply doesn't exist."
"But you don't understand," she insisted. "Hereallyknows."
"Pure coincidence," he retorted lightly. "I've known of such cases. He might hit it three times, four times, a dozen times, but nobody can be consistently right. It's humanly impossible."
"It was over six months ago," she rejoined with conviction, "that he told me to make my first trade. At my cottage he has had installed tickers for all three of the markets. If he is there between ten and three, he keeps close watch of them. And every so often he will say, 'Would you like some pin money?' And always I win, and never lose."
"Well," said Blagden lightly, "we won't quarrel over it. If you say it's so, it's so. But why do you say that you 'desire more?' I should consider you a very fortunate lady. If I could win every time I gambled, I don't think I'd require anything else."
"Oh, yes, you would," she promptly answered. "If you were only allowed to play every week or two, and in a very limited way, and under the direction of another person, would that satisfy you? Of course not. The point is here. I am only allowed to meddle with stocks as an amusement--a plaything. But I want to know how he does it. Then I should be satisfied, for I could make all the money I wished."
"But why so eager about money?" he queried. "You never used to be."
"In two years," she answered, "I have changed a great deal. I am older; I hope wiser. I know that youth fades, that life itself is brief. And before I die, I wish to realize a dream--a vision. I wish to have the finest pleasure yacht in the world and to voyage north, south, east, west, until I have seen all that there is to see upon this earth. Hence my desire for money."
"Now I understand," he replied. Then added, more lightly, "You say you 'want to know how he does it.' Does it appear to be a kind of magic? Does he make his profits in the same way that a conjuror extracts rabbits from a hat?"
His levity nettled her. "You are provincial," she retorted sharply. "You reason that because you have lost money in stocks, everyone must do so. Often it is foolish to believe too much; but sometimes one may believe too little."
He hastened to make amends. "I apologize," he said. "You are perfectly right. And I am really immensely interested in your story. You think, then, that he speculates with some sort of system?"
"I am sure of it," she answered with conviction, "and when I saw you here to-night, I suddenly remembered many things that you had told me about the market, and I wondered if you could not aid me now."
"If I may help," he assured her, "I am wholly at your service. Though I fear I am somewhat at a loss as to how or where to begin."
"And yet," she rejoined, "there is a starting-point. I am confident of it. Are you at liberty this evening?"
"Never more so," he answered.
"Then come with me," she said. "I have a taxi waiting." And Blagden, assisting her to put on her wraps, escorted her to the motor, which whirled them away from the city, mile after mile, until it finally stopped at a pretty cottage, far out in the country, isolated and half hidden in a miniature forest of trees, shrubs and flowers.
A trim maid answered her mistress's ring, then discreetly vanished. "Now," she said, "I will show you what I mean," and leading the way to the study on the floor above, she turned the switch and flooded the room with mellow light. Blagden looked about him with interest. As she had told him, over against the wall stood the three tickers, side by side, and beyond them a desk and a telephone switchboard. In spite of himself, Blagden was impressed. There was an orderliness, an indefinable businesslike touch to the room and its contents which seemed to make it evident that its owner was a man of affairs.
"Well," she queried, "do you believe me now?"
"Oh, it's not a question of belief--" he began, but she suddenly exclaimed, "Wait a moment; I forgot," and hurriedly leaving the room, she returned almost instantly with a small memorandum book in her hand. "Now," she said, "look at this."
Blagden took the book and scanned the entries with care. Here was fifty Reading bought at ninety-three and sold at ninety-eight; and here one hundred bales of May cotton sold at eighteen, fifty-six, and bought in at seventeen, fifty-two. A little further on were ten thousand bushels of December wheat bought at a dollar, fifty-four and closed out at a dollar, fifty-seven. Sometimes the gains were large, sometimes small, but invariably, as she had claimed, each transaction showed a profit. Blagden gazed, fascinated.
"Now," she said, "isn't it wonderful?"
"Wonderful," he echoed. "It's more than that. It's a miracle. If I had met you six months ago, where would I be to-day? I'd be rolling in it; I'd be worth a million."
Her face was as covetous as his. "You've been in the market for years," she said. "Haven't you any way of finding out?"
"I don't know," he answered slowly. "Did you tell me in the café you had a clew?"
She hesitated. "It sounds rather ridiculous," she answered, "but do you think it's possible that the time of day can have anything to do with the strength or weakness of stocks?"
He looked disappointed. "Oh, I've heard that talk down town," he responded. "There are as many theories of speculation as there are speculators. Everyone agrees that there's manipulation--flagrant manipulation--though of course this is indignantly denied by everybody connected with the Exchange. But how this manipulation is managed, no two men agree. I've heard what you hint at, that the future course of stocks is determined by their artificial strength or weakness at certain hours of the day; two o'clock, some people think is the significant time. Personally I never believed in it at all. Why do you ask?"
"Because," she answered, "when he stands here by the tickers, he is continually looking at his watch. I am not supposed to know this; in fact, between ten and three I am excluded from this room; but I have devised means of watching, and that is the peculiarity I have noticed; that, and the jotting down in his notebook of memoranda which he apparently copies from the tape."
Blagden looked puzzled. "I should be very slow," he said, "to believe anything of the kind. And I should think you could manage this affair without my aid. Considering your relations with this man, considering your very obvious attractions, I should think the stage was all set for a modern version of Merlin and Vivien."
She smiled a trifle bitterly. "I will confess to you," she answered, "that the same thing occurred to me. In fact, I attempted it; and failed utterly. Compared with this--" she indicated the tickers--"I am the proverbial dust beneath his feet."
There was silence. At length Blagden spoke. "This fascinates me," he said. "At first, I wholly disbelieved your story; now I do believe it. And upon one condition, I will devote my time, my energy, my best endeavor to the solving of this mystery. But the condition is important."
She regarded him curiously. "Name it," she said.
He rose from his seat, and stood looking at her appraisingly, a cold flame gleaming in his eyes. "It is this," he answered. "You liked me, I think, in the old days, but I was a poor man. I am a poor man to-day. But if we fathom this secret and gain the keys to Paradise, then let us make the building of your yacht a joint enterprise, and let us make the cruise--together."
She too had risen and now stood looking at him with a faint smile upon her lips. "Ours," she responded, "is a quite exceptional friendship. You are a man and I am a woman, and yet we have the great advantage of thoroughly understanding one another. If you can grant me my desire, I will reciprocate. I accept your offer, and I wish you success."
At the street entrance to the café, Mills and Atherton came momentarily to a halt. "Well," observed the stout one, "we've got to hand it to Blagden. He's what you might describe as the original Tabasco. Yet it's no credit to him that he finds adventures; they just naturally come his way. He couldn't dodge 'em if he tried. See what's happened to him now; do you suppose either of us is going to run into anything like that?"
Atherton, still under the spell of Blagden's eloquence, was gazing forth upon the crowded thoroughfare, with its hurrying throngs of pedestrians, and its multitude of motors, passing and repassing incessantly under the glare and brilliance of the bright white lights.
"I think," he slowly answered, "that anything is possible. Blagden is right. Ninety-nine men out of a hundred live and die in a rut. It has to be so; that is life. But if the hundredth man is so situated that he may range the world at will, with eyes open and every sense alert, I believe, with Blagden, that he will find adventure awaiting him at every turn in the road. It's tremendously exhilarating. Here we take leave of each other; you go one way, I go the other, and what we may discover we haven't the shadow of an idea. I think we ought to thank Blagden for waking us up. I haven't felt so keen about living since I can remember."
"Blagden," said Mills, "is a queerer combination than most of us. He's an artistic sort of chap, with all the merits and defects of the artistic temperament. He always makes me think of an airship with its steering gear shot away; he goes like the very deuce, but you can't tell what his destination is, or at what moment a gust of wind may veer him from his course. Prince or pauper; he may become either; but he'll never be one of your commonplace mediocrities."
"You're right," Atherton agreed, "and to-night, at least, I envy him, though I imagine that in the end your plodder is perhaps the happier man of the two. He may get less out of life, but he risks less. Thrills and ills are apt to go together."
His companion laughed. "Well, we've got to risk it," he answered. "We're committed now to a life of adventure, whether we like it or not. I'm going to vary your phrase. 'Thrills for Mills' is going to be my motto. And we must make a start, Atherton; our time is short. Good-night and good luck; we'll see each other Friday."
He raised his hand in farewell, and started leisurely down the street. People by tens and hundreds and thousands surrounded him, enveloped him on every hand, yet of all the multitude he seemed to be the only wayfarer who was not hurried, preoccupied, intent upon his own individual affairs. "This," he concluded, "is too much like the middle of the stream; what I want is some quiet backwater, where there's a chance to pause and breathe."
Leaving the main street, he walked east for several blocks, and turning again parallel to his original course, found himself in one of the poorer residential districts of the city. As he had divined, here there was incident to be encountered, but of too sordid a nature to bear the remotest resemblance to genuine adventure. Old men, ragged, unkempt, muttered requests for a night's lodging, for food, or more openly for the price of a drink. Younger men, of sinister exterior, eyed him as he passed and noting his bulk, allowed him to go on his way unmolested. Women of the street, in gaudy finery, their white faces daubed with scarlet in ghastly mockery of health and beauty, ogled him leeringly, and Mills, sophisticated city dweller though he was, felt his heart sicken at the thought of their venal trade. "If there was some attraction," he thought, "some seduction, that would be one thing. But these wrecks--these walking corpses--it's horrible."
By this time, he had traversed several blocks, and the chances of adventure seemed each moment to be growing slimmer. "I'll go home," he reflected, "and go to bed. And in the morning I'll make a round of the brokers' offices; perhaps I'll be able to pick up news of something really good." And having thus allowed his mind to return to the subject of the market, he began to dream, like all defeated gamblers, of some wonderful way of "getting square with the game." "Cotton," he mused. "A man could make money in cotton. I got in too deep; that was all. If a fellow would only stick to small lots, and regular rules--"
A touch upon his arm aroused him, and he wheeled to confront a girl of a very different type from those whose demeanor had so disgusted him. She was evidently of the working class, but she had the instinctive good taste to dress according to her station, leaving to others the garish footgear, the semi-nudities of costume, and the overpowering stench of cheap perfume. And thus, in comparison with her companions upon the street, she looked so refreshingly youthful and ingenuous, and her big eyes were so appealingly pathetic that Mills, for the first time, began to feel that an adventure, even in this locality, might be both possible and enjoyable.
"I ask your pardon," she said, "for speaking to you, but I am in great trouble, and I thought that perhaps you would be willing to help me."
Mills, still only half aroused from his meditations, stared at her uncomprehendingly, and as he did so was struck afresh by the girl's air of innocence. Her eyes still gazed trustfully into his, her hold upon his arm was not relaxed, and as a result Mills presently found himself replying guardedly, "Why, I might. What's wrong?"
She gave a sigh of relief. "Oh, you are so good," she cried. "I was sure of it when I saw you. And I need someone to help me so badly. Only--" she added shyly, "let's not stand here. It's so conspicuous, and this is a horrid neighborhood; people are always talking. Just come with me; it's only a step--"
Mills hesitated. Perhaps, if he had taken a little less wine, he might have been more suspicious; possibly, if she had not slipped her arm confidingly through his, he might have been less avid of adventure; but as it was, he yielded, and as they walked along she lost no time in acquainting him with the story. It was not she herself, it appeared, who was in trouble, but a friend of hers named Rose, who was only eighteen years old and as beautiful as a picture. Rose, it appeared, had been sought by a policeman on the beat, but being as virtuous as she was pretty, she had indignantly rejected the overtures of this immoral man. Whereupon he had threatened to "get" her, and promptly made good his threat by employing a skillful shoplifter to "plant" some articles of jewelry upon the person of the persecuted Rose. She had been arrested; her case was coming up for trial to-morrow; and alone in the world, she did not know, in her predicament, where to turn for aid. Thus her friend had been prompted to go forth and look for help, and had been attracted by the prepossessing exterior of Mills. "I knew you looked good, the moment I saw you," she repeated, and as she uttered the words, her voice was tremulous either with grief or with some other emotion. Mills was frankly puzzled. The tale struck him as extremely wild and improbable, but on the other hand he was enjoying the society of his guide, and the opportunity of seeing the lovely Rose strongly appealed to him. Just how this meeting was to benefit the Order of Gentlemen Adventurers was perhaps not quite clear, but Mills' mind was not, by this time, working along the lines of strict logic; emotion, rather than pure reason, was in the ascendant. And in any event, he would have had little time to ponder the matter, for the walk, as his guide had promised, was a short one, and he presently found himself following her into a tenement of rather dubious exterior, and up countless flights of stairs whose atmosphere wholly failed to appeal to Mills' somewhat fastidious nostrils. More than once, during the climb, strong suspicion assailed him, and his better judgment counselled flight, but the fear of being a "quitter" restrained him, and he continued his ascent until presently he surmounted the final flight, and found himself in a room somewhat barely furnished, but with an air of comfort and refinement which renewed his confidence in his guide.
She laid aside her hat and coat, and as she turned toward him, he observed with pleasure that she was really exceedingly pretty. "Rose will be here right away," she observed; then, listening for a moment, she added, "There she is now," and Mills, listening in his turn, could hear a light footfall ascending the stair. But in another instant his companion's face turned white. "My God!" she cried, "it's my husband. I thought he was out of town. What on earth shall I do? He mustn't find you here."
Mills gave her one searching glance, muttered grimly to himself, "Well, I'll be damned," and making no effort to escape, sat motionless in his chair, his eyes fixed upon the door, which opened the next moment to admit a small, sinister looking man, who gazed at the couple before him in a manner forbidding and malevolent. Nor were his first words reassuring. "What the hell is this?" he cried, and advancing toward Mills, he demanded truculently, "What the devil are you doing here?"
The girl sprang forward. "Don't hurt him!" she cried. "It's my fault. I oughtn't to have listened to him. But he wanted to come. He said he'd pay me well--"
Her words acted as an infuriant upon this slender but dangerous looking man. "I'll teach you swells--" he hissed, and like a flash he whipped a pistol from his pocket and levelled it at the head of the unfortunate Mills.
For an instant the victim gazed stolidly at the menacing circle of steel; then, with an air of complete detachment from his surroundings, he made an equivocal and wholly unlooked-for rejoinder. "Got a cigarette?" he asked.
The outraged husband glared. From past experience on many such occasions he was quite prepared for men who grovelled and begged for mercy, and once in a great while he had learned to look for a man who showed fight, but a retort like this was distinctly a novelty. And since the question scarcely admitted of a direct reply, he responded with a snarl, "Now don't get gay, young feller, don't get gay."
Mills turned to the girl. "I call that tough," he observed conversationally. "Here I want to register courage, and the only real way to do it is to light a cigarette. I love to see 'em do it on the stage, and now when I have a chance myself, all I can do is just say I'm not scared. But it's not the same thing; it ruins the effect."
The girl eyed him keenly, her face noncommittal, expressionless. The man continued to glare. Mills did not look like a lunatic, and the girl, as a rule, managed to "pick them" to perfection. Yet this time it appeared as though she had made a mistake, and while he hesitated, uncertain as to his next move, Mills obligingly relieved his embarrassment by continuing, "What you want, of course, is to get money out of me or else to damage my reputation. But unfortunately for you, I have neither reputation nor money. As far as reputation goes, I'm a small town guy, unknown in New York, and as for money, I've been playing the wheat market, and if you're looking for my coin, why, as the funny man says, 'I'll help you look.' I'm sorry to be such a disappointment--" he turned once more to the girl--"but this is the time you got the wrong pig by the ear."
The pseudo husband stared fixedly at Mills as if trying to make up his mind as to the truth of his story; then evidenced his belief by abruptly returning his pistol to his pocket, and to relieve his feelings began to vent his indignation upon the girl. "By Gad, you're clever," he exclaimed, and since he did not possess a large vocabulary and depended principally upon repetition for his effects, he added, after a momentary pause, "You're clever, by Gad."
The girl's brow darkened. Evidently she did not take kindly to criticism, and casting about for some means of defence, she jerked her head in Tubby's direction. "Well," she countered, "look at him."
Her four words worked wonders, for Mills, quick to perceive their point, first grinned, then laughed, and finally, partly as a relief for overstrained nerves, partly because the true humor of the whole affair now suddenly dawned upon him, fairly shook with merriment, while the girl, watching him, forgot her resentment and relaxed, until finally she too joined in his mirth, and even her saturnine companion permitted himself the luxury of a grin.
"But see here," cried Mills at last, "I'm not stuck on my looks, or my shape, but the old badger game--why that's positively an insult. Why didn't you sell me a gold brick and be done with it? You must have thought I was a cinch."
"I did," she retorted, "but don't you care, Fatty, you're all right. The joke's on me; I'm sorry I tackled you."
"Well, it's on me, too," he admitted. "You did a good job. Let's call it square, all around."
The man with the pistol had come forward as they talked, and now stood directly in front of Mills, regarding him with a fixed and searching gaze. "Just one minute, now," he cautioned. "A square answer to a square question. There's no double cross to this? You're not going to leak to the bulls?"
"Not much," Mills answered. "Live and let live. I've no kick coming."
Apparently the man was content. "Then see here," he continued, "if you're busted, I can find you a job. My name is Stoat. This old badger stuff isn't my regular line; in my day I was called the best second-story man in New York, and I could turn a good trick now if I needed to. But there's safer games than that; I've had a fake promoting scheme under my hat for a long time, and with your front we could make a killing. With a few little changes you'd be the honest miner to the life you and I and the kid here could work the thing to a frazzle. What do you say?"
Mills hesitated. The change from full pockets to empty ones had wrought a distinct alteration in his moral code. Yet partnership with Stoat was not an attractive prospect. "I don't believe," he temporized, "I'm the man you want. I never mixed up in anything like that."
Stoat yawned audibly. "Well, it's late," he said, "and I'm most cursedly sleepy. I was sitting into a game all last night, and I've got to get to bed. Think this thing over, and if you want to give it a go, drop around to-morrow sometime. You'll be making no mistake; it's safe as can be, and there's big money in it, too."
Mills got up and started for the door. "All right," he agreed, "I'll think it over. Much obliged for the offer." And to the girl he added, "Good night. When you see Rose, remember me to her."
She laughed. "Say," she answered, "you fell for that easy, like all the rest of 'em. It's a shame to do it. But you're a pretty good guy. You come around to-morrow and we'll talk business."
Once more upon the street, Mills gazed around him with fresh appreciation. How near he had been to death he could not guess; his knees felt as they used to at the finish of a three-mile run. To the lights, the noises, the people on the street, he warmed with a new affection. "I'm mighty glad," he muttered, "that I'm still in the picture." And more pensively than was his wont, he turned his steps toward home.
Bellingham for the twentieth time consulted his watch, and finding that it still lacked ten minutes of midnight, he rose, walked over to the window, and stood looking out into the night. In the distance he could see the bulk of the stables looming through the darkness, and near at hand the huge lone pine tree towered in silhouette against the sky; yet his mind was not fixed upon what was before him, but was reviewing once again the events of the day, events which had occurred scarcely twelve hours ago, but which seemed, in retrospect, to have taken place ages since, in the shadow of some dim and distant past.
He could see himself, a distinct and separate entity, leaving the car and hurrying toward the garage, alert, expectant, eager to find Nolan and hear what he had to say. From the same man whom he had seen before he had sought to discover if Nolan was in, and the man had nodded with a curt "Yep," but when Bellingham was half way to the elevator his informant had called him back to explain, "Say, hold on a minute; I forgot; Nolan's quit his job."
The secretary could feel again the sinking of the heart, the shock of disappointment the words had caused. "Quit?" he had repeated, and the man had replied, "Yep. He's quit. New man on the car; a Swede. He's up there if you want to see him." But Bellingham had muttered something about its being a personal matter, and still in a daze, had made his way out of the garage, perplexed and disheartened, and vainly wondering what could possibly have happened to the chauffeur.
It was not an easy problem to solve. Certainly the money he had advanced could have been no temptation to Nolan; twenty dollars was nothing compared with the keeping of a good position. And if the chauffeur's abandonment of his job had not been voluntary, of necessity it must have been involuntary; it appeared as though he must have been detected in his pursuit of his employer, and met with a summary dismissal. Yet if this were so, why could he not still have kept his appointment with the secretary. There seemed to be no satisfactory solution, yet as a practical matter none was necessary; of what importance were theories when he knew that the actual result was a complete failure of his plans to gain information through the instrumentality of Nolan. And as a result he would now be forced to act himself; no choice was left to him; whether he liked it or not, he must assume the risk.
Thus, throughout the remainder of the day, he had laid his plans, and now was decided as to his course. But the hour for action had not yet arrived; two o'clock in the morning was the time he had chosen; and thus he lighted his spirit lamp, made and drank two cups of coffee, and then, setting and muffling his alarm clock, he lay down, fully clothed, upon the bed, to gain a little rest before setting out upon his tour of exploration. But before many moments passed, he realized that the setting of the clock was a needless precaution; the strain he was under added to the stimulant he had taken made sleep an impossibility. And curiously enough his brain, which should have been intent upon the adventure before him, now cast back through the years, and as he lay there he could see, projected against the curtain of the dark, pictures long since forgotten, detached and yet connected, leading with merciless precision to the miserable predicament of his latter days.
Behind the house lay a broad expanse of meadow, gay with flowers and traversed by a brook which had its source in the hills adjoining the farm. Hither, in his boyhood, he made an almost daily pilgrimage, but not to gather the violets and the buttercups which lined its banks, or to hunt for blackbirds' nests in the swamp below. The attraction for him had been altogether different. With his jack-knife he would fashion boats from shingles, imagine them in his mind to be racing yachts, under clouds of sail, and starting them, with scrupulous fairness, amid the ripples of the stream, he would run headlong down the field, just able to keep pace with the current, and watching with breathless interest the outcome of the contest, as the tiny craft swept around promontories, skirted the shallows, and finally crossed the finish line, to be rescued with a forked stick, and carried back up the meadow to race and race again. How had he come to play this game? No one, as far as he could remember, had taught it to him; he had been only six or seven at the time, but the memory persisted, the thrill of the struggle, the eager brook and the no less eager boy--
The scene shifted. Some one had given him a game of "steeplechase," and a new world was born. As clearly as if it had lain on the bed beside him, he could see the oval of the board, the horses, bay, black, white and gray, and he himself, cheeks flushed, heart throbbing, sitting entranced hour after hour, casting the dice, and watching and recording the result of every race. Later had come his college days, with the thrill of real racing; the Futurity, the Suburban, the scramble of dainty thoroughbreds with the bright silks of their jockeys gleaming in the sun. But before this he could dimly recall his first knowledge of the stock market, when his father, forbidden for a time to use his eyes, had asked his son to read to him the quotations in the evening paper. Bellingham could remember that he had made sorry work of it, so that his father, usually the kindest of men, had lost his temper and had soundly berated him for his stupidity. Other days, too, he could remember, of alternate exaltation and depression until the afternoon when he had come home to find his mother in tears, and his father had taken him by the shoulder and said gravely, "Hugh, you must promise me one thing. Never, so long as you live, must you have anything to do with the stock market. It has been the curse and ruin of my life. It must not ruin yours, too." Boylike, he had promised, but a dozen years later, when the lure of the Street had bewitched him, he had not regarded his promise, and with the few thousands at his command, had started to make his fortune. How he had despised the men who traded in ten-share lots; "pikers," he had called them; for it had seemed to him that to deal in hundred and two hundred share lots, on a slender margin, was evidence of true gameness and grit. But this period had not lasted long; soon the ten-share lots became a necessity, and finally an impossibility, until the fatal day when he had borrowed money on a story that was two-thirds a lie, and a week later had seen a quiet, lagging market suddenly declined with incredible rapidity, leaving him hopelessly in debt, and now at the mercy of his long-suffering creditors.
So passed the pictures before his eyes, from the boy running beside the brook to the desperate, harried man. Inheritance or not, here had been the keynote of his life--the love of a contest, a race, a struggle, the thrill of the unknown gamble, the possible chance. And in other ways he had been sane and normal; as men go, a decent sort of man. A sense of injustice surged within him. Was it fair? If a good God ruled the world, why did he implant these fierce desires in the breasts of his children? Why did he change a world of joy and beauty into a hell of discontent? Why did he--
With a start, he came to himself. How long, he wondered, had he been dreaming? The flashlight showed ten minutes of two, and silencing the alarm, he rose, and in his stocking feet crept cautiously to the door of his room and out into the hall. For good or ill, his hour had come.
The 'house was absolutely still. And suddenly, oppressed with the strain of the day, unnerved by the strangeness of his errand, he seemed to himself to be moving in some fantastic nightmare, and he was seized with a panic of fear, so that he could scarcely control his impulse to return as he had come and to abandon his reckless quest. But after an instant, he managed to conquer his quivering nerves, and concentrating all his energies upon his task, he stole down the hallway like a shadow, entered the gallery, and found himself standing before the portrait through which the banker had made his unexpected exit three days before. Copying, as well as he could recall it, the posture of his employer, he pressed with his forefinger here and there upon the canvas, but without result until he reached the hilt of the pictured sword, when almost before he realized what was taking place, the portrait, as before, swung back, and the gateway of adventure lay open before him.
A hundred times, during the day, the secretary had made his plans, and thus, without losing an instant, he entered the orifice, drew his knife from his pocket, and wedging the narrow space between the portrait and the wall so that his retreat would not be closed to him, turned to examine the staircase that lay at his feet.
It was a slender spiral of steel, apparently extending downward for an indefinite distance, and so narrow that there was scarcely an inch of superfluous space on either hand. Without hesitation, Bellingham started to descend, listening from time to time and hearing nothing, until at length he reached the bottom and found himself in a low passageway, with a door at the end. The secretary's heart sank. "Locked," he thought to himself, but equally to his surprise and his delight, the knob turned in his hand, and he entered a small chamber, with a second door at the further end. This additional exit, however, was securely barred, and finding his progress cut off in that direction, Bellingham turned his attention to the room itself.
A first glance afforded him small encouragement. To open the massive safe was clearly impossible; the sideboard was empty; and the desk in the corner, though it appeared, at first sight, to be a promising hiding place, proved, on closer examination, to contain nothing. The secretary's heart sank. Evidently his hopes were vain; his dream of romance gave place to prosaic reality; and with a pang of keenest disappointment he stood ready to admit defeat. Yet since he had risked so much, he decided that before leaving he would make one final search, an investigation of the room so careful and minute that he would be certain that he had overlooked nothing.
Accordingly, he first approached the sideboard, hunting around, behind and under it, removing and replacing each drawer in turn. Yet his efforts were in vain, and when he next transferred his attentions to the desk and began a similar exploration there, he met with no better success until he had removed the last drawer of all, and then, for the first time since he had entered the chamber, he experienced a momentary thrill as the flashlight revealed a crumpled paper which had fallen between the back of the drawer and the rear wall of the desk. Inserting his arm, he brought it forth to find that it was torn, faded and yellow with age, with some words quite illegible and others missing altogether. Yet piecing it together as best he could, he made an attempt to decipher its contents, and the next moment, so intense was the shock, so overpowering the revulsion from despair to exaltation, that he found himself staggering backward as if from a blow, grasping at the table behind him to save himself from actual physical collapse. But the next moment, as his heart once more sent the blood coursing through his veins, he rallied, and without losing a second he returned the drawer to its place, glanced hastily around to make sure that he had left no traces of his visit, and then made his way as quickly as possible up the staircase, through the opening in the wall, and once more regaining his room, he locked the door, lit his reading lamp, and began a systematic study of his prize.
It took only a few moments to make him realize that the task of deciphering the document was to be one of almost insuperable difficulty, but at the same time it became increasingly evident that he had made a discovery the importance of which could scarcely be exaggerated. The paper was a plain sheet of foolscap, apparently a rough draft of a final copy,--torn into eight pieces, of which to Bellingham's chagrin it now appeared that two--the lower rectangle on the right and the third from the top on the left--were missing. In the upper right-hand corner of the paper was the date, January 1, 1882, and beneath, in the middle of the sheet was a heading of which the first word was almost wholly obliterated, but the remaining four, "of the Money Gods," were comparatively clear and distinct. Under this heading were five sub-divisions, the numerals 1, 2, 3, and 5 showing plainly at the left, while the missing 4 would evidently have been written on the first of the two pieces which were lacking. And now, patiently and with infinite effort, straining his eyes over the dull, discolored paper and the faded ink, Bellingham succeeded in bringing out a word here and there until under the first numeral he had an actual sentence, though still with gaps where the wished-for word stubbornly resisted his search. "Most men ---- fools ----blers by nature ---- easiest way ---- to ---- in stocks."
The second sentence, for some reason or other, was much more distinctly written, and in a short time the secretary had produced, "Fundamental plan; bull market, sell ---- top; depress; bear ----ket; buy at bottom; give shorts ----."
But it was the third sentence which proved to be the most startling of all. It was very brief, containing only eight words, of which part of the first and the last four were all that the secretary could read. But they were quite sufficient to make him gasp. "Communi---- ---- signals on the tape." The letters, pregnant with meaning, stared him in the face, and made his breath come quick and fast as he threw an apprehensive glance into the darkness behind him, as though dreading the wrath and vengeance of some ghost from another world.
Almost beside himself with excitement, he toiled on. But the fourth sentence, with its missing fragment, told him little, for while the words were clear enough to the eye, they conveyed no message to his brain. On the upper line were the words, "On the watch," and directly beneath them, "for these signals," but the loss of the left hand paper, and the absolute impossibility of conjecturing what other words completed the sentence, made this portion of the message apparently valueless.
Equally tantalizing was the message under the figure five. The sentence began clearly enough, "The basis will be 1/4 3/8 1/4 if ----" and then came the blank occasioned by the second missing fragment of paper; while the sentence, resumed on the left-hand portion of the document, continued, "5/8 1/2 5/8 if down. Buying and selling ----" then once more the inevitable hiatus, and finally the three words, "on a scale." And this was the end.
The secretary sat gazing straight before him, his brain in a tumult. Coincidence well nigh incredible had led to this discovery, and now left no doubt in his mind that rumors which had been current in the Street for years, but always laughed to scorn by the whole fraternity of brokers, were true, after all. And suddenly, with irresistible conviction, facts, remarks, events, never before understood, now crowded to his mind, clear as crystal in the light of his present knowledge. Signals on the tape. More than once he had heard the story, told with bated breath under pledge of strictest secrecy. But here was proof. And for him, individually, this ancient document revealed all the glories of a new world. And thus, bending once more over the paper, Bellingham toiled until the first light of the dawn crept in at the windows, and rising unsteadily from his desk, he saw staring at him from the mirror a worn and haggard face which he could scarcely recognize as his own.