But the magnate felt no sensation on reading them. That very afternoon,
for that matter, he had seen thousands of them on the streets; and so,
they moved him not at all. Nevertheless, he tossed one to Flomerfelt.
"Pretty serious predicament, eh, Flomerfelt?" he said easily.
Coolly, Flomerfelt rose, reached over for a cigar and lighted it.
"There are only two men in this city who can handle a situation of that
kind," he answered significantly.
Wilkinson merely raised his eyebrows.
"And these two," Flomerfelt continued, "have got to work together. If
they don't----" His eye caught the other's glance and held it. "If they
don't, chief, the devil take the hindmost."
Peter V. Wilkinson laughed until he was red in the face.
"You blamed upstart!" he burst out. "Do you think that Peter V.
Wilkinson isn't able to go it alone?"
"I know he isn't," emphatically.
Wilkinson sprang to his feet.
"Why, you infernal idiot!" he shouted. "Who conceived the scheme
of transferring fifty millions of securities of my own to those
broken capitalists, Ellenbogen, Glackner & Gilroy, and of taking
over a hundred millions of wild-cat stocks! Who thought of having
the stock--the good stock, on the books, transferred to the names
of these three men, and then having them pass it over to an unknown
holder--Leslie Wilkinson! And who thought of sending these three men
to different parts of Europe, where they can't be found! Let those
who will, ask questions of me--you know what answer they'll get! Let
them ask questions of me!" he went on, swelling in the pride of
generalship. "My records show that I'm ruined. Let them ask questions
of Leslie Wilkinson--who's got the stuff, and who doesn't know she's
got it--what will they find out? Who else is there to ask? Three
inaccessible old fools who'll stay where we put 'em until it all blows
over. Who conceived that scheme? And who framed another that disposed
of thirty-five more millions? Tell me that, eh? Was it you?"
Flomerfelt's smile was a sneer. In turn, he rose and looked his chief
full in the face, his own small, ferret eyes alight with contempt.
"It may have taken a good man to conceive the scheme, but it took a
better man to put these things into execution, to----"
Wilkinson laughed.
"To do the dirty work," he interposed, contemptuously.
Flomerfelt nodded.
"Have it that way if you will, chief," he assented. "It's dirty work
any way you may put it. However, don't you forget one thing, it was I
that did it--and doing it, I did what no one else could do."
For a brief interval the two men stood glaring at each other. It was
Flomerfelt who, at the last, lowered his eyes.
"Well, have it so, Flomerfelt," Wilkinson was speaking now, "we won't
quarrel. Perhaps we do belong together--at any rate, you get pay
enough...."
"No, not enough," Flomerfelt mused half-aloud, for his thoughts had
travelled through the closed door, into the hall without, had climbed
up the stairs and were centred on Leslie Wilkinson in the room above.
Wilkinson resumed his seat.
"What are we going to do with Ilingsworth," he began. "That's the first
proposition. You say to----"
"Jug him," finished Flomerfelt. "Take the offensive. Make the first
move."
Wilkinson snorted.
"That's where your 'prentice hand shows up, just as I knew it would.
I'm going to let him go."
Flomerfelt started.
"What!" he ejaculated.
Wilkinson grinned. Slowly he gathered together the newspapers littering
his desk and deposited them in the waste-basket. Then he turned to
Flomerfelt.
"Now, you whippersnapper of an understudy," he paused a moment, "the
reason I'm going to let him go, _is because I'm going to lay the blame
of this whole thing on Giles Ilingsworth_. See?"
Flomerfelt looked at the extras, at his chief, at the walls, the
hangings--now still as death they were--and at the floor. Then he rose
and paced the floor with that noiseless tread of his. Finally he
stopped, and swinging his lithe body about, once more faced his chief.
"By George, Wilkinson, you're great!" he exclaimed. "Ilingsworth a
scapegoat! How did you ever think of it?"
"_When_ did I think of it would be more to the purpose," returned his
chief, not without pride. "I thought of it as I think of everything--in
a flash--while you were trying to induce me to surrender him.
Somebody's got to bear the brunt of this--he's the new blood that's
wrecked us--he and his crowd, so why not he, eh? Why not?"
Flomerfelt's thin lips widened into a diabolical grin.
"How are you going to do it, Wilkinson?"
His chief did not reply immediately. His hesitation made the other's
grin widen all the more.
"I'll have to work that out, Flomerfelt," presently he said, "but I'll
do it. He might as well smart as anyone else. Besides, what will it
amount to, anyway? An investigation--censure--a few bribes--and---- The
rest of us can go to Europe and enjoy ourselves until it's blown over."
"If it ever blows over," put in Flomerfelt. Then he stretched out his
arm and laid his long, lean fingers on the sleeve of Wilkinson's coat.
"Peter V.," he said in a low voice, "I'll give you credit in this, as
well as in other things; but let me tell you something: while you've
been mumbling here, I've worked your idea out--sketched in the details."
"You don't say!" cried Wilkinson. "Good boy! Well?" And he looked at
him questioningly.
But Flomerfelt shook his head.
"No, chief, I'll work it out myself. But I'll say this much, I've got a
hold on nearly every man in the Tri-State Trust Company, the Interstate
also. There are things to be done, things to be sworn to, and only I
know how...." He withdrew his hand. "The question is, Wilkinson," he
went on, "am I to get good pay?... This thing is more serious than you
think. It won't blow over, take my word for it. A million people in
three States are up in arms; what's more, District Attorney Murgatroyd
is up in arms, too."
"You get paid well enough, Flomerfelt, I should think."
"Not well enough," he declared. And again his thoughts went aloft to
the daughter of his chief.
Wilkinson touched a button; in silence the two men waited for it to be
answered. In a somewhat irritated manner Wilkinson touched it again,
and thundered out:
"What's become of the servants?"
Flomerfelt leaned over in alarm.
"The wires--the wires are cut!" he exclaimed. "The telephone is
disconnected," he went on, his face growing ashen with the fear and
mystery of it all.
Wilkinson's excitement was evidenced by the manner in which he shook
his finger in the other's face, called him a fool, and ordered him
to go and fetch the servants that they might explain how the thing
occurred. And he ended with: "Go now, be quick about it!"
At the door, Flomerfelt stopped. In the entrance was Leslie.
"These wires have been tampered with!" he cried out to her. "Does
anybody in this house know how?"
Leslie ignored the question, but instead she said:
"Mrs. Wilkinson wishes to speak with you, Mr. Flomerfelt. You will find
her upstairs, in her boudoir."
Flomerfelt bowed.
"I'll go up with you at once," he told her; but Leslie shook her head.
"No, you'd better go alone. I know about the wires. I came down
expressly to tell father about them."
Flomerfelt reddened with annoyance, nevertheless he started to leave
the room.
"I say," called out Wilkinson after him, "tell those Pinkertons to
drive Ilingsworth away down-town--take him to any place he wants to
go, set him loose. If he runs away, you understand, it will be all the
better for us. And if he doesn't, it will be all the worse for him."
"I'll take care of it, Mr. Wilkinson," said Flomerfelt, adopting the
prefix that he used in the presence of a third party. "The plan is
yours; the details belong to me."
With considerable trepidation Leslie approached her father.
"You're not going to set that Mr. Ilingsworth free!" she begged.
"Father, don't do it! He's dangerous! I told you he had murder in his
mind--I saw it to-day."
Little by little Wilkinson drew from her the whole story, with the
exception of her father's terrible arraignment by Giles Ilingsworth;
and that, for reasons of her own, she left out of her recital.
"Come, come," demanded Wilkinson, shrewdly reading his daughter's face,
"you haven't told me everything! I want to know the rest."
The girl looked away as she said falteringly:
"The rest is nothing--really, there is nothing to tell."
"If it's nothing, then you'd better tell it to me anyway," he
persisted. "Come, dear, what is it that you're holding back?"
For a moment that seemed minutes to her father, Leslie hid her face
upon his shoulder, and did not speak. Finally she broke out with:
"Only something that he told me that I know is false; but if you must
know, I'll tell you what he said...."
* * * * *
On the floor above, Mrs. Peter V. Wilkinson, still in her flowered-silk
kimona, received her husband's confidential man.
"Sit there," she directed, pointing to a chair close to the sofa on
which now she was reclining, propped up by numberless bright-hued
silken pillows.
Flomerfelt did as he was bid, not omitting to kiss the hand that she
had extended to him.
"Now, Flomerfelt," she began, an anxious look on a face that was
usually expressionless, "I want to know just where I stand in all this.
For if there's going to be a crash, I want to know precisely what I've
got--that is, how much money?"
Flomerfelt did not answer at once.
"You know," he said slowly, "that it has not been the custom of Peter
V. to give money to his wife, rather, I should say, to put money in her
name. Like every other business man, he has always needed ready cash,
and----"
"But how do I stand?" she interrupted, impatiently. "What have I got?
Tell me; I must know."
"Well, to begin with, there are your jewels," he declared. "They are
worth thousands--perhaps hundreds of thousands."
"And this house stands in my name, doesn't it?" she asked, brushing
away the question of a few hundred thousands.
"It does," was his brief answer, but without enthusiasm.
"And the house is worth at least ten million dollars, isn't it?" she
went on, with some show of satisfaction. "That's what it cost to build."
Flomerfelt shook his head.
"I should say that it cost much less."
"What!" she gasped. "Why, everybody says it did. The papers...."
Flomerfelt thought a moment.
"I should think four million was an outside figure," he declared. "I
know Peter V. doesn't consider it worth more than that."
"Well, four million is something, at any rate," she returned,
mollified. "I can live on that."
Flomerfelt began to pace the room.
"The difficulty with it, Mrs. Peter V., is that it is mortgaged. The
trust companies hold mortgages on it to the extent of five million
dollars, at least."
Mrs. Wilkinson reached forth and drew him back into his seat.
"Do sit down, Flomerfelt!" she cried; "and don't be a fool! What do
you mean by telling me that the property isn't worth more than four
million, and that, notwithstanding that, the trust companies have
loaned five million on it--more than its value? What trust company
would do a thing like that?"
Flomerfelt's gaze took in the lady of the flowered-silk kimona from the
sole of her foot to the top of her head.
"Um--such trust companies as the Interstate and Tri-State." He paused a
moment, and then added: "With such a man as Giles Ilingsworth handling
the reins----"
"Giles Ilingsworth!" she broke in. "Who is Giles Ilingsworth? Why, I
never heard of him."
Flomerfelt looked at her in well-feigned astonishment.
"You never heard of Giles Ilingsworth! He was the power behind the
throne--the man who wrecked the companies--who did more, who wrecked
Peter V. Wilkinson." He made a movement to go. "There is nothing
further I can do for you, I suppose, Mrs. Peter V.----?"
For the briefest of moments the lady gazed at him in silent
contemplation. Then motioning him again to sit beside her,--which
he did,--she drew his head down close to her lips, and patted it
affectionately.
"Flomerfelt, you're a good friend of mine?" she said.
Wilkinson's confidential man straightened up.
"That depends on how good a friend you are of mine," he answered,
looking her full in the face.
The eyes of Margaret Lane Wilkinson narrowed.
"You do your best to see that I don't come out at the little end of the
horn, Flomerfelt--take care of my interests, even against----"
"Even against Peter V. Wilkinson," breathed Flomerfelt.
"Even against Peter V. Wilkinson," breathed the woman. There was a
pause, and presently she added: "On every occasion, no matter what the
question, I shall agree with you."
"You forget to take into consideration that there's a girl named Leslie
Wilkinson, who----"
She stopped him with a concluding gesture.
"No, not for one moment have I forgotten her," she affirmed. "If the
worst comes to the worst, Leslie has enough to keep us both."
Flomerfelt bent over her.
"It's a bargain," he announced. "We'll seal it with a kiss."
"Why, Mr. Flomerfelt, I never have kissed anybody except Peter V.,"
she simpered, blushing all the while.
"I couldn't help it," he told her on leaving, and passing through the
door, closed it gently behind him. On the second landing he stopped and
thought a while. "Not a bad scheme, that scheme of hers," he mused to
himself. "She doesn't altogether realise that if the time ever comes
when we fight Wilkinson, she and I, that we will be fighting a man
still worth a hundred million dollars. At any rate," he concluded, "my
game is first to fight for Wilkinson, and then--against him."
Meanwhile, in her boudoir, the lady had hastened to the mirror to
contemplate her fairness.
"He's not such a bad chap, after all, that Flomerfelt," she
acknowledged to herself.