Читать книгу Crooks in the Sunshine - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 4

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"Any one else for the board? Last time of asking."

The little company of gloriously bronzed young men and women, lying on the two rafts moored outside the rocky Paradise of the Cap d'Antibes' bathing enclosure, bestirred themselves lazily. Passing at a snail's pace only a few yards away was the speed boat they had been admiring half the morning. Ben Richmond, the presiding genius of the place, who had been careering round the bay for the last twenty minutes and had just slipped off the plank, came swimming towards them with long easy strokes.

"Glorious, you fellows!" he exclaimed enthusiastically. "My, that old gentleman has some engines on her. I'll swear we were doing forty at the bends."

"How many times did they lose you?" a fair-haired girl enquired.

"They tricked me off once," the young man confessed. "Not so bad. The fastest aquaplaning I've ever had."

The elderly gentleman in smart nautical costume leaned over the side of the launch and repeated his invitation.

"Any one else for the board? Last round before lunch."

Ned Loyd, who had been lying prone on his back, his face upturned to the sun, rose to a sitting posture, and, all unaware that thereby he was making history in the criminal records of the world, held up his hand to signify his acceptance of the invitation.

"Guess I'll have one turn," he decided lazily. "Makes you feel like a porpoise lying here all the morning."

His sister Caroline, stretched out by his side, turned halfway towards him. She held up her hand as though to shield her face from the burning sunshine, but in reality to hide the faint shadow of trouble in her eyes. She looked steadily out towards the launch, a very magnificent affair piled with red cushions and with all the appurtenances of nautical luxury. Two very smartly dressed young women in bathing costumes and peignoirs were lying in wicker chairs heaped with voluptuous-looking cushions. A third, in pyjamas of the latest cut, was leaning over the side, smoking a cigarette. The obvious owner had turned aside for a moment to speak with the engineer.

"I wouldn't go if I were you, Ned," the girl on the raft begged. "We can't tell who the crowd are in that boat," she went on, under her breath, "and it isn't worth while risking anything. Seems queer, if you come to think of it, that they should be inviting strangers to go aquaplaning all the morning."

Her brother, however, was already in the water, swimming to the place where the board was floating. He turned on his back and waved his hand.

"I signalled I'd go," he said, "so I'd better have a short turn. The skipper's a harmless-looking old duck, anyway."

It was too late now for anything further in the way of intervention. Caroline Loyd, sitting on the edge of the raft, watched her brother clamber on to the board, listened to the roar of the engines as the launch started off, and still watched as, skilfully manipulating the ropes, he rose cautiously but expertly to his feet. In a moment they were off, Ned Loyd a graceful, swaying figure firmly established upon the board, the nose of the boat, large though she was, slightly out of the water, and a long trail of white, churned-up sea already behind them. The girl kept her face averted from her immediate neighbours, for although she had no idea why, fear, for almost the first time in her life, had come to her.

"Who owns that boat, anyway?" she asked presently. "Does any one know?"

Apparently no one did. There were a variety of rumours passed back to her from one or another of the loungers upon the rafts. A newcomer, who had just swum over from the shore, brought the latest information.

"Commodore B. Jasen, he calls himself," the latter announced, as he clambered up the steps and sank into a prone position. "They say that he is a multimillionaire and that he has taken the Château d'Antibes for the season."

A young bond salesman from Wall Street pricked up his ears.

"Commodore B. Jasen," he repeated thoughtfully. "Well, he didn't make his money down our way or I should have heard something of him."

The girl seemed to have forgotten her sun-bathing. She stood on the edge of the raft—a magnificent figure in her scanty but elegant swimming costume—shading her eyes with her hand. Not once did she look away from the boat. She watched it take a shorter run than usual towards Cannes, watched it sweep round, leaving behind a trough of water and a long trail of foam, watched the swaying figure of the man who, tense and alert all the time, gripped the cords of the plane to which he seemed somehow or other to have become permanently attached. The boat, travelling at great speed, was almost opposite, now about quarter of a mile away. She waved her arm—a significant and imperative signal—but she realised, almost as she did it, that there was scant chance of any one aquaplaning at thirty or forty kilometres an hour looking to the right or to the left. Exactly what she had dreaded happened. The boat failed to make the usual turn. It swept on towards the long tongue of land known as Mosque Point, wheeled round it and out of sight. That was the last any one ever saw of Ned Loyd, better known amongst his college friends and the new world into which he had made tentative entrance as "Lord God Ned."

It was half an hour before uneasiness manifested itself in action, during which time there was no sign of the return of the mysterious launch or its aquaplaning passenger. The blue sea was as unruffled as ever, the sunshine as fierce, the faint breath of westerly wind still gentle and imperceptible. The majority of the bathers had taken no note of the incident at all. They were either in the sea again, or were lying on the rocks anointing themselves, or had clambered up to the restaurant above. The two who were more deeply concerned—Caroline Loyd and Ralph Joslin, a slim dark young man with the complexion almost of an Indian, who had been lying a little apart from the others and had spoken to no one—were already making their way along the beach through the pine woods towards the other side of the point. The young man was only mildly puzzled. He failed to understand his companion's emotion, or to grasp why, through the wonderful tan of her cheeks, the pallor of fear had begun to show itself.

"What's your worry, Caroline?" he asked. "Aquaplaning is child's business to Ned."

"What made them drive on straight past the point?" she demanded almost fiercely. "They always set down passengers near the rafts."

"Well, I don't see that that amounts to anything," he argued. "If the old man's taken the Château d'Antibes, why they've probably gone round there for a drink. Seems natural enough to me. Every one takes a fancy to the lad—you know that. What are you scared of, Carrie? You're not afraid of Ned taking the glad eye from the women?"

"Not I," she scoffed, although there was a sob in her throat. "That isn't my business, but I've got a queer hunch, Ralph. I expect I'll be laughing at it in a few minutes. You saw the cable about looking out for the Lebworthy Gang?"

"Yes, I saw that," he admitted. "What about it?"

"Seeing that they were supposed to be coming out here," she went on breathlessly, "I think Ned might have thought twice before he picked up with a strange crowd."

Her companion laughed reassuringly.

"It's a hell of a long way from Rimmington Drive or back of Broadway to Antibes here."

"They are all such a social lot at the hotel," she went on, almost as though she had not heard him, "but no one seems to know anything about these people at the Château. Still, it isn't likely—it isn't likely, Ralph, is it?"

"What isn't likely?" he demanded almost roughly.

"It isn't likely that these people should have anything to do with the Lebworthy Gang?"

"You've been reading too much crime fiction, Caroline," he expostulated. "That crowd have had me guessing more than once, but I'm not figuring about seeing any of them just in these particular parts. Save your breath, kid. It's rough walking, this."

They scrambled across a stretch of shingle through somebody's garden and on to another beach. Then something like a tragedy confronted them. They were on the other side of the point now, but nowhere in sight of them was anything resembling a motor launch, nor was there anywhere to be seen the bobbing head of a swimmer!

"Don't you start worrying," Ralph enjoined cheerfully, as their eyes swept the empty space simultaneously. "The Château's just round the next corner. We'll have to make our way there somehow or other. There's a wall to climb and somebody else's garden to cross. Guess we'd better have telephoned."

They scrambled forwards. To avoid the wall, they entered the sea and swam—side by side and without a word to each other—the man with strong, fierce strokes and the girl with almost frenzied speed. Presently they reached a long broken cluster of rocks, over which they clambered and dropped down on to the next beach. Right ahead of them was a small harbour in which the motor boat was lying, silent and apparently deserted. By its side was also a small sailing craft and a dinghy, both moored to floating buoys. They hurried along, the girl breaking into a little run whenever there was a strip of sand. In less than ten minutes they had reached the launch. The passengers had evidently all left, for the decks were deserted and the cabin also was apparently empty. They hurried down the wooden dock and stepped on board. In response to Ralph Joslin's shout, a man in blue overalls—apparently a mechanic—thrust his head out from the cabin.

"Hello," he challenged. "Wot yer looking for?"

"Where's the man you took aquaplaning?" Ralph Joslin demanded.

The mechanic displayed a little more of himself and stretched his long limbs.

"Ask me another," he replied. "He waved his hand and slid off the plane just after we rounded the point."

"Why didn't you stop?"

"Why the hell should we?" was the surly retort. "We were only thirty yards from the shore. He got off of his own accord."

Hope shone once more in the girl's eyes. On the other hand, her companion did not appear to share her relief.

"If your passenger got off at the point," the latter remarked, "we should have met him."

"I can't help your troubles," the mechanic said sourly. "It's my job to run this boat and I don't worry about what happens to the passengers, especially when they're fools enough to go riding on them slither boards. If he couldn't swim the thirty yards between him and the point, he should never have got on the board.... Here's the Boss. You can ask him anything you want to."

The man withdrew his head and shoulders and disappeared. His questioners turned round. A very trim and precise-looking elderly gentleman, with white hair brushed back with almost meticulous care, a white moustache and benevolent expression, dressed in correct nautical attire, came hurrying breathlessly down the plank walk and stepped on board.

"What's this I hear?" he asked anxiously. "They're telephoning from the hotel to say that the young man I took aquaplaning has not returned."

"That's what we've come over about," Ralph Joslin replied. "We saw you pass our landing places and round the point. He was holding on then and going strong. We waited but nothing happened. You didn't bring him back and we've seen nothing of him."

"Extraordinary," the other exclaimed. "I should have dropped him by the raft, but I had called out a few minutes before and asked him to come round as far as the Château and have a cocktail. He seemed to me to accept, so we went straight on. When we got to the point, though, he waved his hand, let go quite in the manner of an expert, and dived. Naturally we came along home then. He was only a few yards from the shore."

The girl's eyes had never left the speaker's face. She seemed to be weighing every word he uttered.

"We have just come across the point," she said. "There wasn't a soul anywhere about."

The owner of the launch smiled reassuringly.

"My dear lady," he explained, "the point is much longer than it seems, and if you came the direct way, you might easily have missed your friend. Besides, he may have taken the opportunity of staying to examine that queer building at the end. My own guests are always curious about it. You'd better allow me to send you back in the launch to your landing stage, and when you get there, you will surely find the young man waiting for you."

"Might I enquire your name, sir?" Ralph Joslin asked.

"Certainly," was the courteous reply. "Jasen—Commodore Jasen. I am very sorry if my offer to your friend has brought you any disquietude. Tim," he went on, calling to the mechanic, "take this lady and gentleman back to the Cap landing. You can manage alone for that short distance."

The man made his way towards the engine, rubbing his hands with a piece of waste. The Commodore stepped off the launch and beamed at his departing visitors.

"You'll find him there, all right," he called out cheerily.

There must have been something crazy in her blood that day, Caroline Loyd told herself fiercely. Looking back, it seemed to her that there was an almost satanic expression in that apparently bland, benevolent face, something menacing in the simple words. She swung around to seek consolation for her companion, but Ralph Joslin had none to offer. A memory had come to him—a memory touched with inspiration—and he knew, as well as though he could see it written in the flaming blue skies, that never again in this world would he see his friend and leader, Ned Loyd.

Caroline Loyd heard all the hours of early morning strike. The long night with its anxieties was past. It had become an accepted fact now that her brother had disappeared. When the first shiver of light came from the east, she found herself standing on the balcony of her room at Cap d'Antibes. The paling stars were fading into the sky, the moon was colourless. Away eastward the morn was strangely heralded by breaking lines of cream-coloured foamy clouds with the faintest background of saffron pink. It was the one hour of complete silence in the twenty-four. She leaned forward, listening intently. A pearly mist rode on the far seas. From somewhere behind that came the faintest sounds. She clutched the balustrade and listened. Every moment it became more distinct. Now she was sure. The break in the skies eastward became more pronounced. Soon twilight was to pass and a disc of the sun would be visible. Her beautiful eyes, strained and frantically searching, sought to pierce those mists. All the time the sound continued, the dull beating of a muffled engine. Even before the first gleam of sunlight had escaped, it had slid into sight. From some errand far southwards, the motor boat of Commodore Jasen was rushing homewards towards its harbourage.

Entirely at her ease, with scant signs of the tragedy weighing upon her heart, a tragedy which hung, in fact, like a cloud over the whole of the little community, Caroline, on the following evening, waited in the shabby magnificence of the library of the Château d'Antibes for the man whom she had come to see. Her eyes were dry. There were no longer any signs of the tempest which had swept over her. The first lesson she had learned, when she had embarked upon the life adventurous, was the lesson of self-control. She had lost a good deal of sympathy at the Hôtel du Cap d'Antibes during the last twenty-four hours; every one had thought her inclined to be callous. No one realised from what a battlefield of the emotions her hyperphilosophic attitude had arisen.

Hawk-faced, slim of features and of person, Jake Arnott came into the room with his usual stealthy tread, a pantherlike effigy of a man, notwithstanding his correct dinner attire, the monocle which hung from his neck and the signet ring upon his little finger. He closed the door carefully behind him.

"And what," he asked, "does Caroline Loyd want of us?"

"Nothing of you," she answered curtly. "My visit is to Commodore Jasen."

"We have friends dining," he explained, "local notabilities with whom we wish to stand well. It is, in fact, our début into local society, stage-managed, I am afraid, by the local land agent, but still, important to us. The Commodore thought that perhaps I might deputise."

"The Commodore should have known better," she said coldly. "He can take his own time. I shall wait for him here."

"As you wish," he observed. "I can tell you all you want to know."

"I shall hear it," she replied, "from the man whom I hold responsible."

Jake Arnott, once, alas, graduate of Harvard, later of Chicago, now major-domo in the house of crime, turned on his heel and left the room without a word or gesture of farewell. The minutes passed. To Caroline, waiting before the half-opened window, with the flash of the lighthouse every thirty seconds travelling over the tops of the trees, and the murmur of the sea in her ears, those minutes seemed to become crystallised nuggets in her memory, each one with its measure of burning passion. When at last the period of waiting came to an end, it did so without warning. There was no sound of footsteps outside, but the door was quietly opened and Commodore Jasen stepped deliberately in. His dinner clothes were as immaculate as his yachting costume. His eyes shone with sympathy. His attitude was half apologetic, half deprecating.

"Madame," he said, "a thousand apologies. If I have kept you waiting, I regret. We have friends dining from different parts of the Riviera. It was too late to put them off, even in face of such a tragedy."

Caroline Loyd listened. She had the air of one who had come to listen more than to talk.

"I shall have to wait a great deal longer, Commodore," she said, with a peculiar smile at the corner of her lips. "I think that my feet will have to beat time through life for many years, before I gain what I seek from you. For the present, you can guess, I think, what it is I need."

"My dear lady, in any expression of my regret—"

"Do you mind leaving off?" she interrupted coldly. "We can do without all that rubbish. I want to hear from your own lips that you are the person responsible for what happened yesterday."

There was a brief silence. Commodore Jasen's face had lost its benevolent expression. There was a glint of something repellent in his eyes. It was the same light which had flashed its terrifying message into her apprehension, when he had waved his hand in sarcastic farewell from the wooden quay some thirty-six hours ago. Still he persevered.

"Do you need to come here to ask that?" he demanded. "I am the lessee of the Château and I am the person who was responsible for inviting your brother to take a ride with us upon the sea."

That, for the moment, was the end of Commodore Jasen. Something seemed to blaze out from the girl which paralysed any retort upon his part. In the duologue, for the next few minutes, he was no longer a vital factor.

"I know who you are, Samuel Lebworthy," she cried. "I know what you stand for. I know where you will end. Three years' mild detention, probably, while the others swing. You're as clever as hell—you play the show piece always in front of the tragedy to divert people's attention. You and I may have plenty to say to each other in the future, but don't waste my time to-night. Answer me in plain words—exactly what have you done with my brother?"

"He got just what was coming to him, that's all. Might come to any of us at any time," he added, critically selecting a cigarette from his case. "He got put away."

She listened with unchanged expression.

"You admit it?"

There was a look of gentle remonstrance in his blue eyes.

"Admit it? What a stupid word. It was quite inevitable. Ned knew that."

"Tell me how you did it," she begged. "Ned was a better man than you with fists or a gun, and he could have swum home from your harbour."

The Commodore reflected for a moment.

"Perhaps. But no brains to speak of. I shot him through the cabin window, with one of the new Derlicher rifles, just after we had rounded the Point. As you people were making such a fuss we fished up the body last night and took it out where no one is likely to find it. Anything else?"

"You are in a hurry to return to your guests?"

"Not particularly. I am playing bridge, but my hand is down and there are two or three to take my place. If there is anything else you have to say, let me hear it, now that we are alone together."

"Where did Ned cross your gang?" she demanded.

"My dear young lady," he remonstrated, "it is scarcely possible that you do not know. What has happened has been just in the ordinary course of events. You would have thought nothing of it in Chicago, less in New York. Ned and I got across over a certain Mr. Timothy D. Ryan, who was our fellow passenger on the steamer. We both quite naturally marked him down. There wasn't room for both of us. That's the long and short of it. We had it up against Ned already and Ned went; the better man survives."

"Are you the better man?" she asked.

"Come to me," he replied, "and I'll prove it. We might even consider giving you a small share in the Ryan business. Ned knew quite well that we always wanted you both."

She looked at him with scorn in her eyes.

"I am perfectly satisfied with my position. I prefer to work alone. One thing I do claim, however, and that is a half share in the Ryan business. If you refuse to give it me, you may regret it."

He looked at her in mild amusement.

"Just what do your threats mean?" he asked. "You are perhaps thinking of the French police? Would it be possible that you know so little of the etiquette of our profession?"

"No," she replied. "I am not thinking of the French police. There are surer ways than that."

"You have nothing of a gang to work with," he pointed out. "I know the few stragglers on whom you rely, inside out. They will take you nowhere. If you butt up against us, you will be wiped out. Come along to the other side of the street, Caroline. We'll take care of you."

She laughed in his face.

"Is this a challenge or an invitation?" she asked.

His fingers toyed for a moment with his white moustache.

"You can take it which way you like," he said. "Come to us alone, cut out those other suckers, and you shall stand in even shares with Jake and myself in all fresh business. Those little witches we shipped over from New York mean nothing to us. Who you are or where you come from, God only knows, but you're the sort of woman we want. Make up your mind to it and come along. I'll fetch you myself some time, if you don't."

On the table by her side was a glass which Jake Arnott had been carrying in his hand when he had entered the room. She caught it up and hurled it across at him. With a lightning-like dive he let it pass over his head and splinter against the fireplace.

"I wish you wouldn't do that," he complained mildly. "We pay a very heavy rent for this Château, and breakages count against us. Am I to take it that you are not—"

"You are to take it that I am your enemy," she interrupted fiercely. "You are to take it that whatever scheme you engage in, I shall do my best to wreck. You are to take it that the spirits of two people dwell in me—the spirit of Ned and my own. So that's that."

He shrugged his shoulders as he pressed the bell.

"I would rather," he said, "have had you on my side."

When, a week or so later, Commodore Jasen and his friend Jake Arnott strolled out on to the terrace through one of the mercifully opened windows of the Salle Privée at Monte Carlo, they received a most unpleasant shock. Caroline Loyd, in a most becoming after-bathing costume of embroidered white serge, was lying there, gazing dreamily away towards Italy.

"Hello," she murmured. "Where's Mr. Timothy B. Ryan?"

"What did you say?" the Commodore demanded.

"Mr. Timothy B. Ryan," she repeated. "President of the Chicago Wheat Crushing Mills. A very important man, Mr. Ryan. I thought you were here to look after him."

"What the mischief do you know about Tim Ryan?" Jake Arnott inquired, his teeth and eyes glittering.

"Oh, quite a great deal," she replied. "He crossed on the same steamer with Ned, you know, and we had some very interesting plans all arranged with him. I can't quite get your scheme, but I know that it's something very important. It means keeping him out of the way for a fortnight at least, doesn't it? Well, I suppose that might be done, but I am rather curious," she went on, with an insolent little smile, "as to how you mere men can do it. That Zeigfeld Folly show you have over at the Château won't make much impression on Mr. Timothy Ryan, I don't think."

"Curse you," Commodore Jasen muttered.

"A compliment," she acknowledged. "If I am to be cursed, I am to be feared. In this case, I should not think there was the slightest doubt about it. I am a very dangerous woman."

"Out with it," Jake Arnott demanded. "What's your game, Caroline? Come over with it."

"Why on earth should I tell you?" she answered lazily. "Ned discovered him and, if you want to know what I think about it, I believe that's the sole reason why you bumped him off. I offered to come in fifty-fifty and our dear friend the Commodore evaded the point."

"Well, what about it now?" the latter asked ungraciously.

She scrutinised her fingernails for a moment.

"I am inclined," she confessed, "to rescue him."

"Why?"

"He would be very grateful. Gratitude is sometimes more remunerative even than blackmail. He is a widower. I might marry him."

They turned their backs upon her. She followed them into the room. At the nearest table, in the most important place by the side of the croupier, sat Mr. Timothy B. Ryan, and the stacks of chips in front of him amounted to many thousands. He greeted his friends with a cheerful grin. They saw, however, with sinking hearts, his eyes travel over their shoulders, the lines of mirth fade from his face and something new appear, something which they had never previously associated with Mr. Timothy B. Ryan. There was a faint odour of perfume just by the Commodore's left nostril. He felt a touch upon his shoulder.

"Won't you please present me to Mr. Ryan? I believe a friend of mine crossed from New York with him."

Mr. Ryan rose to his feet. The fact that he had thirty mille upon the table and that the ball was spinning seemed to be a negligible happening. He gazed instead into the face of the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life, a woman too who was smiling at him.

"I don't worry about your friend, Miss Loyd," he said, "but I am surely glad to know you."

She smiled into his face. The ball dropped into its appointed destination. Mr. Timothy B. Ryan had lost his thirty thousand francs. The incident left him unmoved. It seemed to him that he had found something far more wonderful.

"The Commodore has just invited me to have a drink," she lied sweetly. "You would not care to come with us?"

He swept his pile of chips from the table and dropped them into his jacket pocket. A few he left to mark his place.

"A drink," he confessed, "was just what I was needing."

"You're sure you are not missing the game?" she asked.

"Miss Loyd," he declared with fervour, "I am missing nothing that won't be made up to me a hundred times over in the bar there."

Her little laugh was a quite satisfactory response.

Mr. Timothy B. Ryan, comfortably established in the principal guest room at the Château d'Antibes, yawned in somewhat aggrieved fashion as he opened his eyes on the following morning to find his host standing by his bedside. It was before the hour at which he had expected to be called, and he raised himself in bed somewhat sleepily.

"You're an early bird, Commodore, aren't you?" he remarked. "I ordered my coffee for nine o'clock."

"That's all right," the other assured him. "It will arrive in a few minutes. I thought I would like just a short chat with you before you get up."

"Good for you," Mr. Ryan, who had drunk a great deal of whisky the night before, murmured drowsily. "Say, you boys got me lit up last night. I'll be the better after a swim. Any news of the lady?"

"You will probably see her during the morning," his host confided. "She has a good many friends over at the hotel and we all meet about cocktail time. Meanwhile, there's just a word or two I'd like to say."

Mr. Ryan swung a couple of rather pudgy pyjama-clad legs out of bed, stretched himself vigorously and rubbed his eyes.

"Shoot," he invited.

"Did you ever hear by any chance, Mr. Ryan, of the Lebworthy Gang? They started in Chicago, you know, and then moved to New York."

"Yes, I have heard of them," was the prompt admission. "Who hasn't? Pretty quiet they've been lately."

"That," Commodore Jasen explained, "is because they have once more changed their quarters. Chicago to New York—New York to Antibes."

Mr. Timothy B. Ryan paused in the midst of a yawn.

"Who the hell are you getting at?" he demanded incredulously.

"No one," was the suave reply. "I am telling you the truth. It saves time. You are in the hands of the Lebworthy Gang at the present moment. It will cost you five hundred thousand dollars. Not so very much for a man who must have cleaned up ten or twelve millions last year."

Mr. Timothy Ryan's mouth was wide open, his hands were clasping his knees, his position on the edge of the bed was precarious and his general appearance ridiculous.

"Are you kidding me, Commodore?"

"Not a bit of it. I am trying to save time. Explanations are so troublesome. I thought if we could finish our little business in the way I can suggest, you might enjoy your coffee, and I could probably, if you behave sensibly, devise some means of pleasant entertainment for you during the latter part of the day."

"So I am in the hands of the Lebworthy Gang, am I?" Mr. Ryan reflected.

"You are."

"And it is going to cost me five hundred thousand dollars?"

"It is."

The victim of this unfortunate circumstance scratched his head.

"How," he asked shrewdly, "do you expect to get that money from me at all, and how, having got it, do you expect to keep my mouth shut?"

"Pertinent questions," the Commodore admitted. "I will answer you as briefly as possible. We start with some knowledge of your affairs, you see. Here," he went on, drawing out a cable form from his pocket, "is a despatch written out to your firm, which will be handed in this morning at Monte Carlo."

"'Streak of bad luck here. Cable five hundred thousand Barclay's Bank, Monte Carlo. Timothy B. Ryan, Château d'Antibes.'"

"Good," Mr. Ryan approved. "That's the first step. The half million dollars will be cabled over, all right. How do you expect to get the bank to hand the money over to you?"

"You will endorse them over to us upon persuasion."

"And keep my mouth shut afterwards?"

Commodore Jasen shrugged his shoulders.

"There are men who like to live," he reflected, "and there are others who prefer to die. You may be one of the others. There were one or two in Chicago. There were two in New York."

"You mean you would put me away?"

"Nothing in this world," was the emphatic declaration, "would be more certain. You might," he went on, "bring some slight inconvenience upon us, you might even force us to change our habitation, although that I think very doubtful, but there is nothing surer in this world—and you know it, Timothy Ryan—than that your days upon this earth would be numbered. You would be lying somewhere under the sunshine with a bullet through your heart, or somewhere deep down in the Mediterranean, surrounded by curious little fish with unpleasant masticatory habits. No one is ever alive twenty-four hours after the Lebworthy Gang has doomed them to die."

"Well, well!" Mr. Ryan murmured thoughtfully.

"You have to make the choice," his host went on. "I believe you are worth something like twenty millions. You have to make your choice whether you will go on living with nineteen million five hundred thousand or leave twenty millions to your legatees, whoever they may be. To a reasonable man, the choice should be simple."

"Could I have my coffee and a bath on this?" Mr. Ryan asked.

His host touched the bell.

"You can indeed," he assented.

A sombre-looking manservant answered the summons—of French appearance but with an American accent. He arranged a breakfast table by the side of the bed, but Mr. Ryan pointed to the recess in front of the window.

"Guess I'll taste a little of this Mediterranean breeze," he decided. "It will cool my head off."

"You can now prepare the bath," the Commodore directed, "and put out some suitable clothes for Mr. Ryan. Perhaps you would prefer a bathing suit?"

"That goes all right with me," the latter agreed, stumping across the room. "Coffee smells good."

The servant, evidently a well-trained one, produced a dressing gown in which the visitor robed himself. The Commodore drew up an easy-chair on the other side of the window. Together they looked out on the very pleasant view—the little harbour below with the famous motor boat and sailing craft, and beyond the open sea.

"Nice spot this," the prisoner observed, as he poured out his coffee.

"Charming," his companion agreed. "Very expensive to rent, though," he went on, studying his finger nails.

"I have struck some expensive hotels," Mr. Ryan confided, as he buttered a piece of toast, "but five hundred thousand dollars for bed and board—for how long?"

"A week with pleasure," his host suggested.

"Well, even for a week that's a little stiff. Besides which, the great inducement I was promised never appeared."

"Surely Zoë and Laura have their attractions," the Commodore remonstrated.

"The usual Broadway stuff," his guest criticised. "I can pack that sort of rubbish in my own satchel any time I come across, if I want to. But the other—" Mr. Ryan kissed the tips of his pudgy fingers out of the window, towards the hotel where Caroline Loyd was at that moment also looking seawards and making plans. "You might send the cable, anyway," he decided. "I guess they'll get it at opening time this morning. Something like six hours behind, aren't we? They'll toot the money across. Between now and then, I can make up my mind whether I part or whether I take on the Lebworthy Gang."

Commodore Jasen smiled.

"You are the type of man, sir," he said, "with whom I like to transact business."

Commodore Jasen proved himself rather a severe gaoler, for it appeared that his guest developed a headache during the morning, and it was the Commodore who sat with Caroline Loyd at one of the tented tables in the open-air bar at the Cap, and sipped a wonderful concoction of orange juice at a few minutes before luncheon time. Caroline, in the opinion of every one there, had that morning surpassed herself. Her pyjamas were the most delicate shade of pearly pink, their cut was the last degree of elegance. From the shine of her burnished hair to the modified polish of her toe-nails, she was the most perfect thing that the Cap d'Antibes could produce.

"What have you done with my admirer?" she asked querulously.

"He is awaiting a despatch from New York," was the urbane reply. "As soon as it arrives and our little piece of business is transacted, it will give us all the greatest pleasure to have you dine and meet him again."

"I wonder," she reflected, "what it would be like to dine at the Château."

"We should do our best to make it agreeable," her companion assured her.

"Yes," she meditated, "I am sure you would do that. You made his last few hours agreeable to Ned, didn't you?"

Commodore Jasen showed every desire to be tolerant.

"You know perfectly well that Ned asked for it," he pointed out. "He was already upon the black list, and we knew for a fact that he had invited our friend Ryan to visit him at your hotel, although he was quite well aware that we had our own plans for the entertainment of that gentleman. You must admit that it was stupid."

"Yes, it was stupid," she agreed. "I warned him."

"We do not wish," the Commodore continued emphatically, "to run these unnecessary risks. We do not wish to have to proceed to these extreme measures. Year by year crime is becoming more civilised. We try to make a fine art of it. We must have money. We collect it from those who can afford to pay, and we prefer to cut out the rough stuff altogether. On the other hand, when the necessity arises, you know very well what our reputation is."

"Yes, I know," she admitted.

"We can be, and often are, absolutely and entirely ruthless," the Commodore confided, a queer unpleasant expression tightening up the lines of his face. "I talked it over with the others when we made this move. We are going to work peaceably if we can, but if any one doesn't want that sort of treatment, if there is any one who hesitates to come across with what we want, Chicago and New York won't have anything on Antibes."

"And what about Mr. Ryan?"

"We are hoping," the Commodore proceeded gently, dropping his voice a little and exchanging a benevolent smile with a group of passing acquaintances, "that there will be no trouble. We do not wish for trouble. What we want is half a million dollars."

"And none for me," she grumbled.

"Naturally not," was the firm reply. "You can leave your friends and come to us altogether on reasonable terms if you wish. Otherwise—hands off!"

Caroline drew a little sigh and smoothed the silk of her pyjamas petulantly.

"I consider that Ryan was our business," she declared.

"Possession," the Commodore remarked amiably, "is nine tenths of the law."

The under concierge from the hotel had paused at their table. He addressed Caroline.

"There is a telephone message for Madame from Marseilles," he announced.

For a moment Caroline frowned. She glanced swiftly at her companion to see if he had overheard. He was watching with dreamy eyes the flight of some seagulls.

"Is the message put through down here?" she enquired.

The boy pointed to the telephone booth.

"It is here, Madame."

Caroline rose to her feet.

"I am wanted," she said. "Afterwards it is luncheon time. Au revoir, Commodore."

He rose and bowed gallantly.

"Au revoir, Miss Loyd."

The presiding genius of Barclay's Bank, Monte Carlo, was evidently of a hospitable disposition, for a portion of the floor space of the bank was devoted to a long table covered with copies of the latest journals and maps and surrounded with easy-chairs. The public, clients of the bank at any rate, were invited to treat the place as a sort of club, and as the chairs presented a very good vantage ground for pouncing upon the manager, or under manager, when he passed that way, the unspoken invitation was freely accepted.

Mr. Timothy B. Ryan and Commodore Jasen sat, on the following morning, side by side at this table. They had cleared a little space in front of them and an official had deposited there a blotting pad, ink and pens. Mr. Tunney, the bank manager, introduced to big business, was always at his best.

"Yes, we received the credit before closing time yesterday," he admitted. "Everything seems to be in order, Mr. Ryan. What can we do for you?"

"Our friend," Commodore Jasen explained, "has been exceedingly unfortunate at the tables. I daresay you have read of the high play at Juan and at Palm Beach? Mr. Ryan has been a heavy loser at both Casinos, besides losing here. I have been supplying him with money to the extent of my means, but although I don't call myself a poor man, he has, I confess, finished me off. His first desire, now that his money has arrived, is to pay his debts."

The manager produced a book of blank cheque forms and laid them on the table.

"If Mr. Ryan likes to give you an open cheque," he said, "we can cash it at once, or you can open a deposit account with us, Commodore. You bank at Lloyds, I think?"

"I do for the moment," the other assented. "Mr. Ryan's desire is to transfer the whole amount of his credit into my name."

The bank manager was startled.

"The whole amount?" he repeated.

"Well, I guess so," the American sighed. "Might leave twenty thousand dollars for some sort of side show."

"I should like a draft payable in Rome for one hundred thousand dollars," Commodore Jasen continued, "one payable in Paris for two hundred thousand, one payable in London for a hundred thousand, and two millions in French money here."

The bank manager made a few notes.

"This will take a little time," he pointed out.

"Get to work at once," Commodore Jasen suggested pleasantly but with the necessary amount of impressiveness in his tone. "Mr. Ryan and I will go up to the Royalty Bar and see you again in half an hour."

The manager hurried away. Timothy B. Ryan bit savagely at the stump of his cigar.

"I guess I'm making a fool of myself over this business," he muttered. "Why should I stand for losing half a million dollars, even though you are the Lebworthy Gang? The police here can't be such a dud crowd as not to fasten onto a big thing when they're put wise to it."

Commodore Jasen appeared to be profoundly indifferent. He flicked a particle of dust from the sleeve of his blue serge coat.

"We have had all this out before," he reminded his friend. "You can walk out of the bank if you like and refuse to do another thing about it. You will probably be alive for twenty-four hours, unless you go to the police. You certainly won't last a week, though. It's a mortifying experience, no doubt, to have to pay blackmail, but you have just this consolation about it—we never touch the same person more than once."

Mr. Ryan looked more morose than ever. Suddenly his whole expression changed. He laid down his cigar on the edge of the table, shook the ash from his waistcoat, and, springing to his feet, held out his hand.

"If this isn't Miss Loyd," he exclaimed. "The one person I've been wanting to see."

"Not nearly so much as I and a few other people apparently have been wanting to see you," she replied, as she shook hands. "How are you, Commodore? Let me present my friend—Monsieur Drouplain, Commodore Jasen, Mr. Timothy B. Ryan."

Monsieur Drouplain, who was a short, stiff little man with closely cropped black hair and a fierce black moustache, had apparently very little use for Commodore Jasen. He laid hold of the American's hand and grasped it.

"You are Mr. Timothy B. Ryan of the firm Ryan and Butler of Chicago?" he demanded. "Is that not so?"

"Why, sure," was the hearty reply. "Fancy your knowing about my business."

"It is rather my business to know other people's," the newcomer murmured.

"Monsieur Drouplain," Caroline explained, "is the Chef de la Sûreté at Marseilles. He is over here on account of some cables he received yesterday from New York. You have good friends, Mr. Ryan. Some of them over there seemed to have the idea that you were getting into trouble."

"Mr. Ryan will give me ten minutes of his time at once," the Chef de la Sûreté begged, "and I will explain the matter. I am staying at the Hôtel de Paris. Let us proceed there."

He led the way to the door, his grasp on his companion's shoulder a very firm one. The latter looked back.

"I guess I can sign those documents a little later on," he called out to his host. "Come right along down to the hotel and bring Miss Loyd with you. We might see about a bite of luncheon."

The two men disappeared through the swing doors. Commodore Jasen had scarcely moved in his chair. His eyes were like steel points of fire.

"Does this mean intervention on your part, Caroline?" he asked quietly. "You know the price that you will pay? You know the unspoken rule which exists between us and your people and every one indulging in our activities in every city of the States and the world? You know what resort to the police means?"

"Of course I do, my dear man," Caroline assured him, peering into the mirror which she had drawn from her bag.

"It means death," the Commodore continued, without a quiver in his tone. "It has meant death without a single break for the last fifteen years. Even the police stand on one side. Not one living soul has escaped."

Caroline thrust back a refractory wisp of fair hair underneath the white cap she was wearing.

"Untidy, aren't I?" she observed. "You see, we motored fast.... I know perfectly well the etiquette of our profession, my friend, but you will have to believe for a moment what you can prove afterwards with ease. It was not I who sent for the police—I have not approached them in any way. I have divulged nothing concerning your friend Mr. Ryan."

"Then what was the meaning of the telephone message from Marseilles yesterday?" he snapped.

"I always knew you had exceptionally good ears," she sighed. "All the same, you will have to take my word for it that that message had nothing to do with the police."

The bank manager, who had an eye for feminine beauty, approached the two. He bowed, but Commodore Jasen was in no humour to introduce anybody to this pest of a girl—especially such a valuable acquaintance as a banker.

"Rather a formidable piece of business you and your friend have given us, Commodore," he remarked. "I thought I'd better tell you that it will take at least another hour to get all the papers in order and your money counted out. If you can bring Mr. Ryan back to sign after lunch, I think it would be better. You see, we have a lot of tourists here this morning too, from the American liner in port."

"I am so glad we have not to wait any longer," Caroline murmured. "I was just trying to persuade the Commodore," she added, looking up at the bank manager with a very sweet smile, "to take me out and give me a cocktail."

"The Commodore," the manager declared, as he himself opened the door for them, "is a very fortunate fellow."

Her companion objected to entering Caroline's car and they drove down to the Hôtel de Paris in his own open limousine. He whispered a word to his chauffeur as he stepped out, and the latter was visible, a few moments later, loitering in the shadows of the bar entrance. Caroline selected two comfortable chairs and the Commodore lighted a cigarette with steady fingers. He had chosen a place on the right-hand side of Caroline and within a few yards of the open door. A very close observer might have noticed something sinister in the way his fingers were caressing the protuberance in his hip pocket. For anything he knew, this might be a trap, and he was not to be caught unprepared. He took swift stock of the room and was forced to decide that there was not a suspicious-looking person in it. Caroline herself had edged her chair a little closer to his, as though prepared for a few minutes' intimate and pleasant conversation. There was not a shadow of fear in her eyes, although she must have noticed his chauffeur lounging outside and the stealthy movements of her companion's fingers. He waited till the glasses were placed on the table before them, then he leaned towards her.

"Caroline Loyd," he said, and his voice, although it was pleasantly modulated, was full of menace, "if this is a trap, I want you to understand that the first person who goes out will be you. Two of us have you covered."

"Don't suggest such unpleasant things," she begged. "You are spoiling my appetite and I am ravenously hungry. You've got nothing against me. I'm even hoping that you will invite me to lunch."

"How is it that the Chef de la Sûreté of Marseilles has come here to look for Ryan and it was you who received the telephone message from Marseilles yesterday morning?" Commodore Jasen demanded. "I'm waiting for an answer to that question and it is about time I got it. Don't flirt about with that mirror or come any nearer to me, Caroline. I can see him coming in just as well as you. You may think the odds are in your favour, but they aren't. There are two others here who've got him covered—and you too—beside myself. If it's a plant, you'll get what you deserve from me. Stay where you are."

"My dear man," she remonstrated, "don't be absurd. Ici, Monsieur," she called out.

The newcomer advanced with a smile and a bow.

"Dick," she said, "I congratulate you, for the Commodore—who is really a very clever man—believes that you are Monsieur Drouplain, Chef de la Sûreté at Marseilles! Where did you leave Mr. Ryan?"

"He's put it over the purser and got the state suite on the boat," was the reply from the fierce little man in unexpectedly broad American. "They're just off."

"Who is this person and what is he talking about?" the Commodore gasped.

"Well," Caroline explained, "his name is Dick Ferber. He's one of our little lot. Four of us altogether, you know. Two we left at Marseilles—Dick had a little business on there—Ralph is in Antibes, and myself. Dick, shake hands with the Commodore."

"Glad to know you, I'm sure," the little man remarked with a broad grin.

The Commodore did not reciprocate. Caroline shrugged her shoulders.

"My dear man," she begged, "you must be a sport. There is nothing in our Magna Charta against either of us outwitting the other if the opportunity arises. If I had squealed, I knew quite well that I should have signed my own death warrant. I never dreamed of doing such a thing. You chose to cut me out of it and run this little affair with Mr. Ryan by yourself. I decided to teach you a lesson and to play a hand against you. I've played it fairly. You have lost, and Mr. Ryan, who is now on the ocean, has saved half a million dollars. He will keep his mouth shut and there's no trouble anywhere. What about that lunch?"

Commodore Jasen drew a long breath and summoned the barman.

"Telephone over for the maître d'hôtel," he directed, "to bring the menu from the restaurant."