XX

The sleepiness that Lanyard alleged was no mere subterfuge to end a

wearing conversation, the fatigue he felt was all too real, harvest of

many toilful days and nights of broken rest, so real that, once he

ceased to stave off its creeping paralysis with inflexible resistance,

it overwhelmed him of a sudden altogether. It was with something very

like the carriage of a somnambulist that he permitted the still

sprightly Peter Pagan to lead him from the library, through a maze of

corridors and stairs apprehended as in dream, and leave him at last in a

lordly bedchamber.

Here by early dawn-light he undressed like an automaton, fell across the

bed rather than laid him down upon it, and in a trice was sleeping

heavily. . . .

The sun grew so old its level rays struck in at length beneath the

window awning and burned his face with a crimson glare till Lanyard

started up, bemused, out of a nightmare of stokehold drudgery--only to

fancy himself, with that ruddy beam boring through blue shadow to lend

colour to the illusion, back in his stateroom on the Port Royal, waiting

for the pretty person of Liane Delorme to justify her knuckling of the

door.

But nobody had knocked, the band of raw red gold was stationary that

barred the dusk, it was a bed that held him, not a berth, the spacious

sleeping quarters of a pampered landlubber were his instead of cramped

and bare accomodations aboard an ocean-going boat; and he was quickening

to apprehensions of a plight more exigent even than that which Liane had

come to tell him of upon that other nightfall, in the Bahamas, weeks

ago; by courtesy a guest in the town-house of a new-found ally, in fact

no better than a prisoner in the stronghold of his most embittered

enemy . . .

Fagged though he had been all through that parley of the small hours,

Lanyard had likewise been far too thoroughly alive to its vital bearing

upon the issue of whether or not this life of his were worth the

struggle, to have slighted any innuendo in Morphew's attitude, however

trivial in seeming or elusive. And now recalling, weighing and minutely

searching every spoken word and unsaid implication, he perceived no

reason for reconsidering his verdict on their consequence, that

Morphew's proposal of an alliance had been as treacherous as his own

complaisance toward it. . . . A memory the cause of corroding chagrin,

to him who had never before met offer of oppression with less than flat

defiance, to whom the bare thought of compromise with an overbearing and

corrupt antagonist was one to sicken over. He had sour comfort of the

saying that it's fair to fight the devil with fire, he would liever have

known himself surely the poor thing they pictured him, uncontrollably

subject to criminal lapses, than to remember he had been reduced to

trafficing with cattle such as Morphew--and on terms of Morphew's

choice!

Yet it had been that or worse--a knife in his back, very likely, before

he could find out the truth for himself about those latterday prowlings

of the Lone Wolf that enemy and friend alike attributed to Michael

Lanyard, that the friendliest guesses ascribed to the cropping out of

ingrained criminal proclivities which the best will in the world might

neither eradicate nor hope to hold in check.

God knew it might be true! and if it were, then it was time indeed to

let Society rid itself of such a menace. But first all doubts must be

resolved . . .

Morphew had had the best of him from the outset, had chosen the ground,

forced the fighting, outgeneralled him in every skirmish, beaten him

down at last to his knees, forced him to stomach quarter on conditions

unspeakably humiliating. But better to bow to such abasement than

forfeit every chance to clear his scutcheon or, failing, tear him down

whose malevolence had been the first cause of its smirching, down from

the strong place he had set up to be his refuge, and bury him deep in

its ruins--though these bury not Morphew alone.

To compass an end so just, to avenge society as he revenged himself, was

the one way Lanyard could conjecture to make amends for being as life

had made him; to this he dedicated himself without any reservation

whatever, renouncing every cherished prejudice against unfaith and

double-dealing, holding no sacrifice whether of scruples or of life

itself too heavy a price to pay for its accomplishment, refusing to know

any depth of degradation to which he would not gladly descend with the

promise that at the bottom he would find Morphew's throat defenseless.

Intuition gave one gleam of hope. Making no claim to the ability to read

Morphew's mind, Lanyard assumed with confidence to assay his manner; and

recreating this to his mental vision, as it had been manifest in last

night's rencontre, estimated every facet of it false. Morphew only too

possibly might have been sincere in all he had asserted concerning the

recrudesence of the Lone Wolf in the flesh of Michael Lanyard; but his

honest scorn, paraded for what he professed to consider disingenuous

efforts to hide behind a claim of lost memory, had been in Lanyard's

judgment sheerest sham, paste indignation donned for the occasion and,

by that token, for some sly purpose. Morphew had taken too much humbling

at Lanyard's hands to spare him without some compensating end in view,

not conceivably a sordid one alone. If in actual need of money he was

little likely to reject it unless Lanyard and none other, operating as a

burglar, earned it for him. Power such as he pretended to, intelligently

exerted, could hardly have failed to bring to heel that enterprising

understudy of the Lone Wolf, who had been so busy all the while that

Lanyard had been becalmed in the Bahamas, and bend him to Morphew's

purposes as Morphew now proposed to bend Lanyard. So it seemed not

unreasonable to assume that the use which Morphew had for Lanyard was

another than he avowed, some end that Lanyard alone of all men could

serve, therefore not an end of simple avarice--in short, nothing but the

satisfaction of some all-absorbing private passion.

Morphew knew, and knew that Lanyard knew--must have known, or was a

denser dunce than Lanyard thought him--that last night's compact had

been a farce, that neither of them meant to abide by it one moment

longer than suited his convenience, and finally that so long as Lanyard

lived and had his liberty Morphew's own liberty if not his very life was

in jeopardy. Yet he had preferred that risk . . .

A man so ruled by his passions was surely vulnerable: it remained to

bide one's time with every wit wide awake to catch and profit by the

first clue that Morphew might let fall, then strike with all the

shrewdness one could muster at the weak spot so exposed. Lanyard would

hardly have to school himself to patience very long . . .

Arrived at this conclusion, scarcely one to content him, nevertheless

the one with which he must for the time being be content, Lanyard

permitted considerations of more material sort to assert their claims,

with the promptly resultant discovery that he was both sticky and

hungry, in sore need of a bath and breakfast. And sitting up, he made

another discovery, that his privacy had not been respected while he

slept. His weatherbeaten wardrobe had vanished from the chair over which

he had thrown it on going to bed; in its place he found a flowered

dressing-gown of thinnest silk and a pair of bedroom slippers--a costume

supremely suited to such sultry weather, as long as one remained

indoors. He perceived himself to be indeed a prisoner.

In the bathroom still a third discovery awaited him when, having turned

on the hot-water tap in the tub, he had his first look at himself in

the mirror above the washstand. Mirrors had been rare furniture of the

scenes in which his life had been staged of late, and he was interested

to view the effect of a six weeks' untamed growth of beard, had been

rather looking forward to revising it, as soon as he could lay hands on

a sharp pair of scissors, into a neat Van Dyke, a style calculated to be

more becoming and hardly less disguising. But one glance showed him that

Morphew or another had been beforehand with him, had played Delilah to

his Samson while he slept; that wanton luxuriance had been edited

already and in such vandal spirit that nothing could now be done for it

but shave it off entirely.

Scissors had been left on the glass shelf below the mirror, together

with a razor, soap and a brush. In resignation Lanyard clipped and

shaved, telling himself that it wouldn't do to resent the

impertinence--not yet--it was just Morphew's delicate way of serving

notice that Lanyard must not count on any liberty of action

unhandicapped by constant danger of being identified with the original

of that confounded flashlight, in other words, that any attempt to elude

his watchful care would be extremely impolitic.

Later, while he wallowed in hot water, Lanyard heard footfalls in the

bedchamber, then a discreet voice just outside the bathroom door.

"I beg pardon, sir, but I thought I heard you moving about. Mr.

Morphew's compliments, and you'll be dining out of Town tonight with him

and Mr. Pagan; the car is ordered for seven o'clock."

"That's very interesting--thank you. What time is it now?"

"Just on six, sir. I've laid out your dinner clothes, and now, if you

wish, I'll fetch your coffee. Perhaps you'd care for grapefruit, too,

and a bit of toast."

"I'm sure I would, thanks, especially if I'm in for anything of a

drive."

"That I can't tell you, sir--Mr. Morphew didn't say."

By the time Lanyard had finished towelling, his breakfast was waiting.

He consumed it in a thoughtful turn, eyeing the array of clothing

provided for him, hoping that the tailor who presumably had taken his

measure while he slept had been a better man at his trade than the

barber who had operated on his beard. But misgivings were groundless;

the dinner-coat, most ungainly of garments when it isn't just right,

turned out to be a very tolerable fit, and he could not complain of a

shortage of anything he required to make him feel entirely at

ease--barring money. Even a cigarette-case and a wafer-thin watch with

chain of platinum had been fitted into the waistcoat pockets.

Finding himself dressed with twenty minutes to spare, he had the

curiosity to try the door. It wasn't locked. He went down the stairs

deliberately, expecting at every step to encounter Morphew or Pagan or

else discover some servant spying on him. But nothing of the sort:

everything was being done to beguile him into believing he was entirely

at liberty on his own recognizance. He knew too much, however, to act on

any such rash assumption.

He met nobody, for that matter, either in the halls or in the

living-rooms, and was twirling lonesome thumbs in the library of

mortifying associations when the clock chimed the hour, and promptly the

servant who had waited on him upstairs put in appearance, bringing a hat

of black felt and a slender stick of ebony, ivory-capped.

"The car is waiting, sir, if you are quite ready."

"Quite--thanks. But Mr. Morphew and Mr. Pagan?"

"They are neither of them at home, sir. I believe it is their intention

to meet you wherever it is you are to dine--the chauffeur will know."

"Then I'm to make the trip alone?"

"Yes, sir."

A certain quality of cheek in the way Morphew had made his arrangements

won an ungrudged laugh as Lanyard accepted the hat and stick.

The Rolls-Royce landaulet at the door was so brightly blue and sleek it

might have been making its first run from the show-room floor. The

liveried footman who held its door with all the rare poise of his kind,

saluted smartly as Lanyard got in, and smartly doubled round the car to

hop up to the chauffeur's side: the vehicle began to move almost before

he was formally posed in his place with folded arms. But Lanyard

remarked that the rear-view mirror above the wheel was so tilted as to

afford the driver a view of the tonneau; and knew by this that to

discover symptoms of intending unceremoniously to leave the car would be

unwise.

At the same time he inclined to dispute the wisdom that had provided a

progress of so much state and ostentation for one so badly wanted; for

while it was true enough that the police in uniform were far too busy

supervising the traffic of the Drive to have room in their heads for

thoughts of the Lone Wolf, it was equally true that plain-clothes men

were presumed to be aboard and on the qui vive, it wasn't an extravagant

flight of fancy that supposed a chance crossing of trails, a casual look

into the car fixing on the features of its passenger and kindling with

recognition . . .

But when furtive reconnaissance astern, at intervals in the course of

the first twenty minutes, had satisfied him that the landaulet was being

discreetly dogged by another car, an unpretentious affair in sober paint

occupied by three men of competent presence, compact bodies who rode

with eyes alert, and looked quite capable, jointly and severally, of

giving a good account of themselves in action, he concluded that it

wasn't worth his while to worry about adventitious interference on the

part of the police, who, if inspired to such an attempt, would stand

about as much chance of stopping the Rolls-Royce and arresting its

tenant as the latter would of winning his freedom by means of a flying

leap. One might as profitably occupy one's leisure trying to guess one's

destination: and the next hour satisfied Lanyard that the route had been

mapped with intent to confuse him. For after following main-travelled

ways to White Plains, the landaulet and its satellite struck off into a

bewildering tangle of back-country roads in which, as night closed down,

it was easy to lose one's sense of direction. Lanyard could only

surmise that they were describing a circuitous course to the North and

East of Greenwich.

It was hilly countryside they traversed, for the most part thinly

settled. Long stretches of lonely road spaced infrequent clusters of

farm buildings and crossroad communities. Few other vehicles were

encountered. The Rolls-Royce seldom slowed down to forty miles an hour,

while the following car closed up till its headlamps lighted brilliantly

both sides of the landaulet, rendering it out of the question as well as

foolhardy to seek to leave the latter unobserved by a sudden dive into

the dark.

Not that Lanyard entertained the remotest desire to commit his fortunes

to a hope so forlorn, he was too well possessed by curiosity concerning

the nature of the scheme which Morphew was maturing, for Lanyard's

introduction to which he had plotted an approach so tortuous, and which

that evening could hardly fail to declare. It wasn't in reason that the

man should take so much trouble to manufacture an atmosphere of mystery

without a purpose of uncommon moment. And if it were true that he had

some more than ordinarily devilish project brewing, Lanyard would feel

cruelly slighted if denied a chance to get at least a peep into it.

Something after nine the cars picked their way through the outskirts of

a town of good size, then found a by-road through open country fragrant

with the breath of salt water, leading on to infer that Long Island

Sound could not be far away. Properties jealously enclosed in walls or

wrought-iron fences bordered the road, occasional gateways opened up

fleeting vistas of drives that led toward lighted windows in the

distance. Apparently a community of wealthy land-holders . . .

The landaulet turned in at last between two stone piers supporting

handsome iron gates, and followed a winding drive through spacious

lawns, dimly revealed by starlight, to a porte-cochère. The footman

jumped down to the door, Lanyard alighted. As he ascended steps leading

to a broad veranda, he heard the Rolls-Royce purr away behind him, and

saw the headlights of its attendant car sweep down the drive that curved

round to the rear of the house.

The veranda was lighted only by windows opening on it that diffused a

gentle glow at best upon patches of flooring set with summer furniture,

and deepened the gloom of the spaces intervening. The house was silent,

nobody moved in an imposing entrance-hall that was visible through

screen doors; and Lanyard pulled up, at a loss for his welcome.

That came, however, without too much delay: a low sweet laugh lifting up

from the darkness between the two nearest windows, then a small shape of

beauty and gracious animation running swiftly toward him with both hands

extended.

He caught them with an exclamation of pleasure, and stood looking in

wonder into the smiling eyes of Folly McFee.