"Rubbish! I have no fear," he answered as both stood there in the darkness.

"Yes, but, you are injudicious," declared the old servant. "If not, you would have heeded young Rolfe's warning, and your present dangerous position might have been avoided. Adams means mischief. You surely can't close your eyes to that!"

"I know he does," answered the millionaire in a voice that seemed harsh and hollow. "I know I was a fool."

"You took a false step, and can't retrace it. If you had consulted me I would have given you my views upon the situation."

"Yes, Levi. You're far too fond of expounding your view on subjects of which you have no knowledge. Your incessant chatter often annoys me,"

was his master's response. "If I have committed an error, it is my affair--not yours. So go to bed, and leave me alone."

"I shall not," was Levi's open reply.

"I'm master here. I order you to go!" cried Sam Statham in an angry, commanding tone.

"And I refuse. I will not allow you to run any further risk."

"What do you antic.i.p.ate?" his master asked with sarcasm. "Are you expecting that my enemies intend to kill me in secret. If so, I can quickly disabuse your mind. It would not be to their interests if I were dead, for they could not then bleed me, as is, no doubt, their intention. I know Adams and his friends."

"So do I," declared Levi. "Whatever plot they have formed against you is no doubt clever and ingenious. They are not men to act until every preparation is complete."

"Then why fear for my personal safety?" asked the millionaire. "I always have this--and I can use it," and he drew from his pocket something which glistened in the darkness--a neat plated revolver.

"I fear, because of late you've acted so injudiciously."

"Through ignorance. I believed myself to be more shrewd than I really am. You see I admit my failing to you, Levi. But only to you--to n.o.body else. The City believes Sam Statham to possess the keenest mind and sharpest wits of any man between Temple Bar and Aldgate. Strange, isn't it, that each one of us earns a reputation for something in which really does not excel?"

"You excel in disbelieving everybody," remarked Levi outspokenly. "If you believed that there was some little honesty in human nature you might have been spared the present danger."

"You mean I'm too suspicious--eh? My experience of life has made me so," he growled. "Of the thousand employees I possess, is there a man among them honest? And as for my friends, is there one I can trust-- except Ben and yourself, of course?"

"What about Rolfe?"

Sam Statham hesitated. It was a question put too abruptly--a question not easily decided on the spur of the moment. Of course, ever since his failure to go to Belgrade, he had entertained some misgivings regarding his secretary. There was more than one point of fact which did not coincide with Rolfe's statements. The old man was quickly suspicious, and when he scented mystery, it was always a long time before his doubts were allayed. Like every man of great wealth, he had been surrounded by sycophants, who had endeavoured to get rich at his expense. The very men he had helped to fortune had turned round afterwards and abused and libelled him. It was that which had long ago soured him against his fellow men, and aroused in his heart a disbelief in all protestation of honesty and uprightness.

Levi recognised his master's lack of confidence in Rolfe, and it caused him to wonder. Hitherto he had been full of praise of the clever and energetic young secretary by whose smart business methods several great concerns in which he had controlling interest had been put into a flourishing condition. But now, quite of a sudden, there was a hesitancy which told too plainly of lack of confidence. Was the star of Rolfe's prosperity on the wane?

If so, Levi felt sorry, for he was attached to the young man, whom he felt confident had the interests of his master thoroughly at heart. Old Levi was a queer fish. He had seldom taken to anybody as he had done to Mr Rolfe, who happily cracked a joke with him and asked after his rheumatics.

"Levi," exclaimed Statham after a few moments of silence, "is it not absurd for us to chatter here, in the darkness? It's past one. I wish you to go downstairs and leave me alone."

"Why?" demanded the old retainer.

"Because I have a strong reason for opening the door myself. I--well I promised that my visitor should be seen by no one except myself. Now, do you understand?"

Levi did not answer for a few moments.

"Then in that case," he said with reluctance, "I suppose I must do as you wish, only I'm very much against you opening the door yourself. You know that!"

And grunting, his dark figure moved along the hall, and he disappeared down the stairs, wishing his master "good-night."

Statham, having listened to his retreating footsteps, re-entered the library, which was still unlit, and, going again to the window, peered forth into Park Lane.

Rain was falling, and the street-lamps cast long lines of light upon the shining pavements. In the faint ray of light that fell across the room from without he bent and looked at his watch. It was half-past one--the hour of the appointment.

The old fellow raised both hands to his head and smoothed back his grey hair. Then he drew a long sigh, and waited in patience, peering forth in eager expectancy.

For another ten minutes he remained almost motionless until at last his ear caught the sound of a footstep coming from the direction of Oxford Street, and a dark figure, pa.s.sing the window, stopped beneath the porch.

Next second he flew along the hall to the door, opening it noiselessly to admit a woman in a black tailor-made gown and motor-cap, her features but half concealed by a thin veil of grey gauze.

She crossed the threshold without speaking, for he raised his finger as though to command her silence. Then, when he had closed the door behind her and slipped the bolt into its socket, he conducted her along to the dark study, without uttering a word.

Her att.i.tude and gait was that of fear and hesitancy; as though she already regretted having come there, and would fain make her escape--if escape were possible.

CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.

IN WHICH MARION IS INDISCREET.

On entering, old Statham switched on the electric light quietly, the soft glow revealing the pale countenance of his guest.

The blanched face, with its apprehensive, half-frightened expression, was that of Marion Rolfe.

"Well," he said in his thin, rather squeaky voice, after he had closed the door behind her and drawn forward a chair, "you have at last summoned courage to come--eh?" He smiled at her triumphantly. "Why have you refused my invitation so many times? My house, I know, bears a reputation for mystery, but I am no ogre, I a.s.sure you, Miss Rolfe."

"Whispers have come back to me that I am believed by some to be a modern Blue Beard, or by others a kind of seducer; but I trust you will disbelieve the wild rumours put out by my enemies, and regard me as your friend."

She had sunk into the soft depths of the green silk upholstered chair, and, with her motor-veil thrown back, was gazing at the old man, half in fear, half in wonder. To his words she made no response.

"I hope the car I sent came for you as arranged?" he said, at once changing the subject.

"Yes. The man arrived punctually," she answered at last. "But--"

"But what?"

"I ought never to have come here," she declared uneasily. "I will have to go before Mr Cunnington to-morrow for being absent all night, and shall certainly be discharged. He will never hear excuse in any case.

Instant dismissal is the hard and fast rule."

"Not in your case, Miss Rolfe," replied the old millionaire. "Remember that it is not Mr Cunnington who controls Cunnington's, Limited. I have asked you here in order to speak to you in strictest confidence.

Indeed, I want to take you into my confidence, if you'll allow me.

Perhaps you will be absent from Oxford Street a week--perhaps a month.

But when you return you will not find the vacancy filled." His cold eyes were fixed upon hers. She found a strange fascination in the old man's glance, for he seemed to fix her and hold her immovable. Now, for the first time she experienced what Charlie had so often told her, namely, that Samuel Statham could, when he so desired, exercise an extraordinary power over his fellow men.

"Absent a month?" she echoed, staring at him. "What do you mean?"

"What I say. The car is awaiting you at the Marble Arch, isn't it?"

"I suppose so. The chauffeur put me down there--at your orders, I believe."

"I told you to put on a thick coat and motor-veil. I see you have done as I wished. I want you to go on a long journey." She looked at the grey, immovable face before her in sheer astonishment. To this man both her brother Charlie and she herself owed their present happiness. And yet he was a man of millions and of mystery. Charlie had always been reticent regarding the strange tales concerning the house in which she now found herself, a visitor there under compulsion. Max, on the other hand, had often expressed wonder whether or not there was really any substratum of truth.