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Then the mysterious driver, swinging himself lightly off his horse, and doffing his fur cap, showing them a face not only handsome, but perfectly familiar to them, exclaimed: "You see, my dear friends, that it was neither a bandit nor His Satanic Majesty who drove you by the nearest road to a robber's castle or the lower regions, but your very good neighbor, Fritz Von Eisenfeldt, who has had at once the pleasure and amusement of taking you safe and sound to Olè's, after all!"
Cleigh barked, half out of his chair. "Eighty thousand by Eisenfeldt. I don't know what crazy fool he's dealing for, but he offers me eighty thousand." Cleigh got up and pressed a wall button. Presently a man stepped into the salon from the starboard passage. He was lank, with a lean, wind-bitten face and a hard blue eye. "Dodge," announced Cleigh, smiling, "this is Mr. Cunningham.
For all that, the fellow was as mad as a hatter. "Of course I'm a colossal ass, and half the fun is knowing that I am." The banter returned to Cunningham's tongue. "But this thing will go through I feel it. I will have had my fun, and you will have loaned your treasures to me for eight months, and Eisenfeldt will have his principal back without interest. The treasures go directly to a bank vault.
If these treasures were honourably yours I'd never have thought of touching them. But you haven't any more right to them than I have, or Eisenfeldt." Dennison leaned back in his chair. He began to laugh. "Cunningham, my apologies," he said. "I thought you were a scoundrel, and you are only a fool the same brand as I! I've been aching to wring your neck, but that would have been a pity.
Mad? Of course I'm mad! Four-year-old shell, the pearls of the finest orient! The shell alone in buttons would have recouped Eisenfeldt. He was ugly when he saw that I had escaped him. Threatened to expose you. But knowing Eisenfeldt for what he is, I had a little sword of Damocles suspended over his thick neck. The thought of having lost eight months' interest will follow him to Hades.
It is inevitable that Eisenfeldt gets the rug and the paintings, and you are made comfortable for the rest of your days. A shabby business, and you shall rue it." "My word?" "I don't believe in it any longer," returned Cleigh. Cunningham appealed to Jane. "Give me the whole story, then I'll tell you what I believe," she said. "You may be telling the truth."
"Of course the Great Adventure Company had to be financed," went on Cunningham with a deprecating gesture. "Naturally," assented Cleigh. "And that, I suppose, will be my job?" "Indirectly. You see, Eisenfeldt told me he had a client ready to pay eighty thousand for the rug, and that put the whole idea into my noodle." "Ah!
The moment Eisenfeldt sees these oils and the rug he becomes my financier, but he'll never put his claw on them except for one thing that act of God they mention on the back of your ticket. Some raider may have poked into this lagoon of mine. In that case Eisenfeldt wins." Cleigh smiled. "A pretty case, Cunningham, but it won't hold water.
"That's worth many pearls of price!" "Supposing," said Cleigh, trickling the beads from palm to palm "supposing I offered you the equivalent in cash?" "No, Eisenfeldt has my word." "You refuse?" Plainly Cleigh was jarred out of his calm. "You refuse?" "I've already explained," said Cunningham, wearily. "I've told you that I like sharp knives to play with. If you handle them carelessly you're cut.
Illegally, perhaps, but still I had it. It is a copy that hangs in the European gallery. There's a point. Gallery officials announce a theft only when some expert had discovered the substitution. There are a number of so-called Da Vincis, but those are the works of Boltraffio, Da Vinci's pupil. I'll always be wondering, even in my grave, where that crook, Eisenfeldt, had disposed of it." Mrs.
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