His words caused me to start. I certainly did not like the man's att.i.tude, for whatever I said, or whatever pretense I made, he refused to be appeased. All I could do in the circ.u.mstances was to express regret that Mr. Rayne had been compelled to go to London, and to again ask him to call at Half Moon Street.

His allegations against Lola incensed me. I tried to obtain from him further details of his allegations, but he remained mysterious and triumphant. So in that spirit he left me, and departed in the car he had hired from Thirsk.

After a hurried dinner I got out the Rolls, filled up the tank, and set out on the long journey to London. As hour after hour I swept along the great North Road, my big headlights glaring before me, I felt more than ever apprehensive.

Could it be that the bald-headed man had actually discovered the leading spirit of the great gang of which I could only suppose he had been an unimportant member? If so, then for my own safety I ought to warn Rayne of his peril. Yet it was all hateful to me. I had been inveigled into that untenable position which I held, and now escape was impossible. I felt, however, in honor bound to protect Lola, even though that Italian crook had made those airy allegations against her.

I drove on through the night against a pelting rain that fell between Grantham and Stamford, but at the Wansford cross-roads it cleared up, and gradually the gray dawn showed.

It was half-past eight when I drove into the garage off the Tottenham Court Road, and I took a taxi to the Great Central Hotel, where I had a wash and a sleep till noon.

Then I went round to Half Moon Street, but found that Rayne was at the Automobile Club. I found him there just as he was going in to lunch with two ladies whom I had never before seen.

My presence seemed to alarm him, for with excuse he left the ladies and took me out into the big hall.

There I told him of Gori's visit and of his threats.

He laughed.

"I only hope he will come and see me, George," he said. "But somehow, I don't think he will! You know now what to do. Madame is alone at the Carlton and ready to accompany you. I'm sorry I can't give you lunch, George, but I have two guests. I shall be anxious to know how you get on. Telephone to me in confidence after you've been to Ripley, won't you? Good-by."

And he pa.s.sed across the hall and rejoined his two smartly dressed guests, crooks, like himself, I supposed.

CHAPTER XVII

THE SIGN OF NINETY-NINE

At half-past eight I called for Duperre's wife at the hotel, and she came down wearing a plain, dark-brown motor coat with a small, close-fitting cap to match. She was, indeed, unusually dowdy in appearance.

"Well, George," she exclaimed, as she sat behind me in the car and I drove down Pall Mall, "we're going out on a little adventure, I understand. Do you know where we're going?"

"Down to Ripley, on the Portsmouth Road," I replied. "I have to meet a man named Houston at the Talbot Hotel. That's all I know," I answered.

"Yes," she said. "I know Houston. We must be careful to-night--very careful."

We went through the crooked roads of Kingston and out through Surbiton towards Ditton, when, after a long silence, she exclaimed as she bent towards me:

"Tell me, George, have you ever heard the name of Gori, and if so, in what connection? I ask this in confidence between ourselves, as the outcome may mean much to both of us."

"I don't quite understand you, Madame," was my polite reply. "I only wish your husband had asked that question."

"Look here," she said in a low, tense voice, "you love Lola! I know you do. Then will you, for her sake, reply to me openly and frankly?

Have you in these past few days met a bald-headed Italian named Luigi Gori? And in what circ.u.mstances?"

I remained silent for some minutes. Then I said:

"I have met a man named Gori. He called upon Rudolph."

"When?" she gasped.

"He called on Monday night."

Madame Duperre held her breath for a few moments. She seemed to be calculating.

"I recognize certain grave probabilities in Gori's visit," she said, and then lapsed again into silence.

Presently I pulled up before the big old seventeenth-century posting-house in the long, quiet village of Ripley, once noted in the late Victorian craze of the "push-bike" as being the Mecca of the daring cyclist who ran out of London and back.

The great gateway through which the mail coaches for Portsmouth used to rumble was dark and cavernous, but on the right I saw a small door, and opening it found myself in a very low-ceiled but cosy bar, in which burned a great log fire with shining pewters above it. The Talbot is nothing if not a link with the days of the highwaymen of Weybridge Heath. Few inns in England are so unspoiled by modern improvements as the Talbot, at Ripley.

In the rather dim light of that low-pitched, well-warmed inn parlor, with its wide, inviting chimney-corner, I saw four men. One of them, facing the firelight, I recognized from the photographs Rayne had shown me--the man with the moonstone in his tie.

I ordered my drink loudly, and looked him full in the face. Then, when a few moments later I had drunk it, I wished the barman good night and went out. Reentering the car, I drove out of the village towards Guildford, and there waited expectantly. In ten minutes he came out of the darkness.

"Mr. Hargreave?" he asked, and, after replying, I invited him inside the car, whereupon he at once recognized Madame in the half-light. It was plain that they were known to each other.

"I expected Vincent would be with you. Where is he?" asked the man named Houston.

"He's away. I don't know exactly where he is," Madame replied. "But what game are we going to play to-night?"

"A very merry one. It may be amusing, it may be tragic," was the man's reply. "We're picking up May Cranston at Horsley Station presently."

"May Cranston!" echoed Madame, astounded. "I thought she went to America after that affair in Dinard!"

"So she did, but she's back again. May is a pretty shrewd girl, you know."

"I'm well aware of that. But why are we meeting her?"

"She'll probably tell you," was the fellow's reply, and, at his direction, I turned the car into a narrow side road which ran for miles through woods and coppices until at last, after pa.s.sing through two small villages, we came to a wayside station dimly lit by oil lamps.

There we waited for about a quarter of an hour, when the slow train from Waterloo ran in, and from a first-cla.s.s carriage there stepped a tall, well-dressed girl wearing a rich fur coat and small hat. She was evidently expecting the car to meet her, for she walked straight up to it and entered, being greeted by Madame and Houston, who were inside.

I followed the newcomer and got into the driver's seat, whereupon Madame introduced me.

The moment she opened her lips I knew she was American, and also from her speech and expressions I knew that she was a crook who moved in good society.

"We'll drive through Merrow and over to Hindhead," Houston said. "We'd better avoid the High Street of Guildford, for the police might possibly spot the car. So we'll go by the side roads. I was over there three days ago on a motor-bike, so I'll pilot you."

And then he turned to gossip merrily with the good-looking American girl, who seemed most enthusiastic concerning our mysterious adventure.

"To-night ought to bring us a clear twenty thousand pounds," he said.

"More, my dear Teddy," the girl replied. "But since I saw you in Chicago four months ago I've had a very narrow squeak. I was nearly pinched by old Shenstone from New York. d.i.c.ky Diamond gave me the tip, and I cleared out from my hotel just in time. Had to leave all my trunks and eight thousand dollars' worth of jewelry behind me. And now I dare not claim them, for the police have seized them. Somebody gave me away, but I don't know who. Wouldn't I like to know--just! You bet I'd get even on them!"

"A good job you were warned," said Madame. "d.i.c.ky was over here last June. I spent the evening with him at Prince's."