Wingate, after several strenuous hours spent in Slate's office,
returned to his rooms late that night, to find Peter Phipps awaiting
him. There was something vaguely threatening about the bulky figure of
the man standing gloomily upon the hearth rug, all the spurious good
nature gone from his face, his brows knitted, his cheeks hanging a
little and unusually pale. Wingate paused on the threshold of the room
and his hand crept into his pocket. Phipps seemed to notice the gesture
and shook his head.
"Nothing quite so crude, Wingate," he said. "I know an enemy when I see
one, but I wasn't thinking of getting rid of you that way."
"I have found it necessary," Wingate remarked slowly, "to be prepared for
all sorts of tricks when I am up against anybody as conscienceless as
you. I don't want you here, Phipps. I didn't ask you to come and see me.
I've nothing to discuss with you."
"There are times," Phipps replied, "when the issue which cannot be
fought out to the end with arms can be joined in the council chamber. I
have come to know your terms."
Wingate shook his head.
"I don't understand. It is too soon for this sort of thing. You are not
beaten yet."
"I am tired," his visitor muttered. "May I sit down?"
"You are an unwelcome guest," Wingate replied coldly, "but sit if you
will. Then say what you have to say and go."
Phipps sank into an easy-chair. It was obvious that he was telling the
truth so far as regarded his fatigue. He seemed to have aged ten years.
"I have been down below in Stanley's rooms," he explained, "been through
his papers. It's true what the inspector fellow reports. There isn't a
scrap of evidence of any complication in his life. There isn't a shadow
of doubt in my mind as to the cause of his disappearance."
"Indeed!" Wingate murmured.
"It's a villainous plot, engineered by you!" Phipps continued, his
voice shaking. "I'm fond of the boy. That's why I've come to you. Name
your terms."
Wingate indulged in a curious bout of silence. He took a pipe from a
rack, filled it leisurely with tobacco, lit it and smoked for several
moments. Then he turned towards his unwelcome companion.
"I am debarred by a promise made to myself," he said coldly, "from
offering you any form of hospitality. If you wish to smoke, I shall not
interfere."
Phipps shook his head.
"I have not smoked all the evening," he confessed, "I cannot. You are
right when you say that we are not beaten, but I like to look ahead. I
want to know your terms."
"You are anxious about your nephew?"
"Yes!"
"And why do you connect me with his disappearance?"
Phipps gave a little weary gesture.
"I am so sick of words," he said.
"We will argue the matter, then," conceded Wingate, "from your point of
view. Supposing that your nephew has been abducted and is held at the
present moment as a hostage. It would be, without doubt, by some person
or persons who resented the brutality, the dishonesty, the foul
commercial methods of the company with which he was connected. An
amendment of those methods might produce his release."
"And that amendment?"
Wingate picked up a newspaper and glanced at it, pulled a heavy gold
pencil from his chain and made a few calculations.
"Your operations in wheat," he said, "have brought the loaf which should
cost the working man a matter of sevenpence up to two shillings. You seem
to have dabbled in a good many other products, too, the price of which
you have forced up into the clouds,--just those products which are
necessary to the working man. But we will leave those alone, if you were
to sell wheat at forty-five per cent less than to-day's price, I should
think it extremely likely that Stanley Rees would be able to dine with
you to-morrow night."
"You are talking like a madman," Phipps declared. "It would mean ruin."
"How sad!" Wingate murmured. "All the same, I do not think that you will
see your nephew again until you have sold wheat."
"You admit that you are responsible, then?" Phipps growled.
"I admit nothing of the sort. I am simply speculating as to the possible
cause of his disappearance. If I had anything to do with it, those would
be my terms. To-morrow they might be the same; perhaps the next day.
But," he went on, with a sudden almost fierce break in his voice, "the
day after would probably be too late. There are a great many hungry
people in the north. There are a great many who are starving. There is
one in London who is beginning to feel the pangs."
"You are ill-treating him!" Phipps cried passionately. "I shall go to
Scotland Yard myself! I shall tell them what you have said. I shall
denounce you!"
"My dear fellow," Wingate scoffed, "you have done that already. You have
induced those very excellent upholders of English law and liberty to set
a plain-clothes man to following me about. I can assure you that he has
had a very pleasant and a very busy evening."
Phipps rose to his feet.
"Wingate," he exclaimed, "curse you!"
"A very natural sentiment. I hope that you may repeat it a good many
times before the end comes."
"You are a conspirator--a criminal!" Phipps continued, his voice shaking
with excitement. "You are breaking the laws of the country. I shall see
that you are in gaol before the week is out!"
"A good deal of what you say is true," Wingate admitted, "with the
possible exception of the latter part. Believe me, Peter Phipps, you are
a great deal more likely to see the inside of a prison than I am. You
will be a poor man presently and poor men of your type are desperate."
Phipps remained perfectly silent for several moments.
"Wingate, you are a hard enemy," he said at last. "Will you treat?"
"I have named the price."
"You are a fool!" Phipps almost shouted. "Do you know," he went on,
striking the table with his clenched fist, "that what you suggest would
cost five million pounds?"
"You and your friends can stand it," was the unruffled reply. "If not,
your brokers can share the loss."
"That means you make a bankrupt of me?" Phipps demanded hoarsely.
"Why not?" Wingate replied. "It's been a long duel between us, Phipps,
and I mean this to be the final bout."
Phipps moved his position a little uneasily. He was keeping himself under
control, but the veins were standing out upon his forehead, his frame
seemed tense with passion.
"Tell me, Wingate, is it still the girl?"
Wingate looked across at him. His face and tone were alike relentless,
his eyes shone like points of steel.
"You did ill to remind me of that, Phipps," he said. "However, I will
answer your question. It is still the girl."
"She was nothing to you," Phipps muttered sullenly.
"One can't make your class of reptile understand these things," Wingate
declared scornfully. "She came to me in New York with a letter from her
father, my old tutor, who had died out in the Adirondacks without a
shilling in the world. He sent the girl to me and asked me to put her in
the way of earning her own living. It was a sacred charge, that, and I
accepted it willingly. The only trouble was that I was leaving for Europe
the next day. I put a thousand dollars in the bank for her, found her a
comfortable home with respectable people, and then considered in what
office I could place her during my absence. I had the misfortune to meet
you that morning. Time was short. Every one knew that your office was
conducted on sound business lines. I told you her story and you took her.
I hadn't an idea that a man alive could be such a villain as you turned
out to be."
"You'd be a fine fellow, Wingate," Phipps said, with a touch of his old
cynicism, "if you weren't always sheering off towards the melodramatic.
The girl wanted to see life, she attracted me, and I showed it to her.
I'd have done the right thing by her if she hadn't behaved like an
hysterical idiot."
"The girl's death lies at your door, and you know it," Wingate replied.
"It has taken me a good many years to pay my debt to the dead. I did my
best to kill you, but without a weapon you were a hard man to shake the
last spark of life out of.--There, I am tired of this. I have let you
talk. I have answered your useless questions. Be so good as to leave me."
The shadow of impending disaster seemed to have found its way into
Phipps' bones. He seemed to have lost alike his courage and his dignity.
"Look here," he said, "the rest of the things which lie between us we can
fight out, but I want my nephew. What will his return cost me in hard
cash between you and me?"
"The cost of bringing wheat down to its normal figure," Wingate answered.
"I couldn't do it if I would," Phipps argued. "There's Skinflint
Martin--he won't part with a bushel. I'm not alone in this. Come, I have
my cheque book in my pocket. You can fight the B. & I. to the death, if
you will--commercially, politically, anyhow--but I want my nephew."
Wingate threw open the door.
"There was a girl once," he reminded him, "my ward, who drowned herself.
To hell with your nephew, Phipps!"
Passion for a moment made once more a man of Phipps. His eyes blazed.
"And to hell with you!--Hypocrite!--Adulterer!" he shouted.
Wingate's fist missed the point of his adversary's chin by less than a
thought. Phipps went staggering back through the open door into the
corridor and stood leaning against the wall, half dazed, his hand to his
cheek. Wingate looked at him contemptuously for a moment, every nerve in
his body aching for the fight. Then he remembered.
"Get home to your kennel, Phipps," he ordered.
Then he slammed the door and locked it.