It was four o'clock on the following afternoon, dark and threatening
outside, precursory of a thunderstorm.
In that chair in Max's room, where Charlie Rolfe had sat on the previous
morning, was the polished cosmopolitan, Jean Adam, lazily lolling back,
smoking a cigarette.
Max had lunched over at White's, and just come in to find Adam awaiting
him. The Frenchman had risen and greeted him merrily, took the
proffered Russian cigarette, and they; had settled themselves to chat.
"I've been expecting every day to hear from you," Adam exclaimed at
last. "When do you propose starting for Constantinople?"
"Well, I've been thinking over the matter, and I've come to the
conclusion that just at present it is impossible for me to leave London.
I have other interests here."
Adam stirred uneasily in his chair. This reply filled him with chagrin,
yet so clever was he, and such a perfect type of ingenious adventurer,
that he never showed the least trace of surprise.
"Really," he laughed, "that's very unfortunate--for you!"
"Why, for me?"
"Well, the missing of such a chance would be unfortunate, even to a
Rothschild," he said. "There's hundreds of thousands in the deal, if
you'll only go out with me. You're not a man of straw. You can afford
to risk a thousand or two, just as well as I can--even better."
"I would willingly go if it were not for the fact that I find I must
remain in London."
Adam laughed, with just a touch of sarcasm.
"Ah! the lady! I quite understand, my dear fellow. The charming young
lady whom I met with you the other night does not wish you to leave her
side--eh? We have all of us been through that stage of amorous ecstasy.
I have myself, I know that; and if I may tell you with the frankness of
a friend, I've regretted it," he added, holding up his white palms.
"All men do not regret I hope to be the exception," remarked Max
Barclay, pensively watching the smoke from his lips rise to the ceiling.
"Of course. But is it wise to turn one's back upon Fortune in this
way?" asked Adam, in that insidious manner by which he had entrapped
many a man. "Review the position calmly. Here is a project which, by
good luck, has fallen into my hands. I want somebody to go shares with
me in it. You are my friend, I like you. I know you are an upright
man, and I ask you to become my partner in the venture. Yet you refuse
to do so because--well, merely because a woman's pretty face has
attracted you, and you think that you please her by remaining here in
London!
"Is it not rather foolish in your own interests? Constantinople is not
the Pole. A fortnight will suffice for you to get there and back and
clinch the bargain. Muhil is awaiting us. I had a wire only yesterday.
Do reconsider the whole question--there's a good fellow."
Max had said nothing about the meeting with Marion. Therefore he
believed that she had not told her lover. Adam was reflecting whether
she might not, after all, be a woman to be trusted. This refusal of
Max's to go out to Turkey interfered seriously with the plans he had
formed. Yet what those plans actually were he had not even told the
hunchback. He was a man who took counsel of nobody. His ingenious
schemes he evolved in his own brain, and carried them into effect by his
own unaided efforts.
The past history of Jean Adam, alias John Adams, had been one of amazing
ups-and-downs and clever chicanery. He knew that Samuel Statham held
him in awe, and was now playing upon his fears, and gloating over the
success which must inevitably be his whenever he thought fit to deal the
blow. It would be irresistible and crushing. He held the millionaire
in his power. But before he moved forward to strike, he intended that
Max should be induced to go abroad. And if he went--well, when he
thought of his victim's departure his small, near-set eyes gleamed, and
about the corners of his mouth there played an expression of evil.
"My decision does not require any reconsideration," said the young
fellow, after a pause. "I shall remain in London."
"And lose the chance of a lifetime--eh?" exclaimed Adam, as though
perfectly unconcerned.
"I have some very important private matters to attend to."
"I, too, used to have when I was your age."
"They do not concern the lady," Max said quickly. "It is purely a
personal matter."
"Of business? Why, you'd make as much in an hour over this Railway
business as you'd make in twenty years here in London," Adam declared.
"Besides, you want a change. Come out to the Bosphorus. It's charming
beside the Sweet Waters."
"All sounds very delightful; but even though I may let the chance of a
fortune slip through my fingers, I cannot leave London at present."
"But why?"
"A purely private matter," was his reply, for he did not wish to tell
this man anything concerning the strange disappearance of the Doctor and
his grave suspicions of Charlie Rolfe. "I can tell you nothing more
than that."
"Well, I'm sure the lady, if she knew that it was in your interests to
go to Turkey, would urge you to go," declared Adam. "She would never
keep you here if she knew that you could pull off such a deal as I have
put before you."
"She does know."
"Oh! And what does she say?"
"She suggested that I should go with you."
"Then why not come?"
"Because, as I've already told you, it is impossible. I am kept in
London by something which concerns the welfare of a very dear friend,"
Max answered. "You must put it before somebody else. I suppose the
affair cannot wait?"
"I don't want to put it before anybody else. If we do business, I want
you and I to share the profits."
"Very good of you, I'm sure; but at present I am quite unable to leave
London."
Max was wondering for the first time why this man was so pressing. If
the thing was a really good one--as it undoubtedly was, according to the
friend he had consulted in the City--then there could not be any lack of
persons ready to go into the venture. Was it sheer luck that had led
this man Adam to offer to take him into it, or had the man some ulterior
motive? Max Barclay was no fool. He had sown his wild oats in London,
and knew the ways of men. He had met many a city shark, and had been
the poorer in pocket through the meeting. But about this man Adam was
something which had always fascinated him. The pair had been drawn
together by some indescribable but mutual attraction, and the concession
by the Sultan which must result in great profits was now within his
reach. Nevertheless, he felt that in the present circumstances it was
impossible to leave London. Before doing so he was desirous of solving
the problem of the disappearance of Doctor Petrovitch, and clearing up
the question of whether or not there had been foul play.
Rolfe's denial of the previous day had complicated matters even further.
He was convinced, now that he had reflected calmly, that his friend was
concealing something from him--some fact which had an important bearing
upon the astounding affair.
Was Charlie playing a straight game? After long consideration he had
come again to the conclusion that he was not!
In his ear was the voice of the tempter Jean Adam. Fortune awaited him
in that sunlit city of white domes and minarets beside the Bosphorus--
the city of veiled women and of mystery he had always hoped to visit.
Would he not spare fourteen days, travel there, and obtain it?
It was a great temptation. The concession for that railway would indeed
have been a temptation to any man. Did not the late Baron Hirsch lay
the foundation of his huge fortune by a similar irade of his Majesty the
Sultan?
The man seated in the deep armchair with the cigarette between his lips
looked at his victim through his half-closed eyes, as a snake watches
the bird he fascinates.
Jean Adam was an excellent judge of human nature. He had placed there a
bait which could not fail to attract, if not to-day, then to-morrow--or
the next day. He had gauged Max Barclay with a precision only given to
those who live upon their wits.
To every rule there are, of course, exceptions. Every man who lives
upon his wits is not altogether bad. Curious though it may be, there
are many adventurers to be met with in every capital in Europe, who,
though utterly unscrupulous, have in their nature one point of the most
scrupulous honour--one point which redeems them from being classed as
utter blackguards.
Many a man, who will stick at nothing where money can be made, is loyal,
honest, and upright towards a woman; while another will with one hand
swindle the wealthy, and with the other give charity to the poor. Few
men, indeed, are altogether bad. Yet when they are, they are, alas!
outsiders indeed.
Adam was a man who had no compunction where men were concerned, and very
little when a woman stood in his way. His own adventures would have
made one of the most interesting volumes ever written. Full of
ingenuity and tact, fearless when it came to facing exposure, and
light-hearted whenever the world smiled upon him, he was a marvellous
admixture of good fellow and scoundrel.
He knew that his clever story had fascinated the man before him, and
that it was only a question of time before he would fall into the net so
cleverly spread.
"When do you anticipate you could go East--that is, providing I can get
the matter postponed?" asked Adam at last, as he placed his cigarette
end in the ash-tray.
"I can't give you a date," replied Max. "It is quite uncertain. Why
not go to somebody else?"
"I tell you I have no desire to do so, my dear friend," was the
Frenchman's reply. "I like you. That is why I placed the business
before you. I know, of course, there are a thousand men in the City who
would only jump at this chance of such a big thing."
"Then why not go to them?" repeated Max, a little surprised and yet a
little flattered.
"As I have told you, I would rather take you into partnership. We have
already decided to do the thing on a sound business basis. Indeed, I
went to my lawyers only yesterday and gave orders for the agreement to
be drawn up between us. You'll receive it to-night or to-morrow."
"Well," replied Max with some hesitation, "if it is to be done, it must
be done later. At present I cannot get away. My place is in London."
"Beside the lady to whom you are so devoted, eh?" the Frenchman laughed.
Max was irritated by the man's veiled sarcasm.
"No. Because I have a duty to perform towards a friend, and even the
temptation of a fortune shall not cause me to neglect it."
"A friend. Whom?"
"The matter is my own affair. It has nothing to do with our business,"
was Max's rather sharp response.
"Very well," said the other, quite unruffled. "I can only regret. I
will wire to-night to Muhil Pasha, and endeavour to obtain a
postponement of the agreement."
"As you wish," Max said, still angered at this importation of the woman
he loved into the discussion. "I may as well say that it is quite
immaterial."
"To you it may be so. But I am not rich like yourself," the other said.
"I have to obtain my income where I can by honest means, and this is a
chance which I do not intend to lose. I look to you--I hold you to your
promise, Barclay--to assist me."
"I do not intend to break my promise. I merely say that I cannot go out
to Turkey at once."
"But you will come--you will promise that in a few days--in a week--or
when you have finished this mysterious duty to your friend, that you
will come with me?" he urged. "Come, give me your hand. I don't want
to approach anybody else."
"Well, if you really wish it," Max replied, and he gave the tempter his
hand in pledge.
When, a few seconds later, Jean Adam turned to light a fresh cigarette
there was upon his thin lips a smile--a sinister smile of triumph.
Max Barclay had played dice with the Devil, and lost. He had, in his
ignorance of the net spread about him, in that moment pledged his own
honour.