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The thoughts were chasing one another through his brain. Then he took up the receiver from the telephone instrument which stood upon the table. "1560 Mayfair," he asked in a low tone. They all stood listening, grouped around Graham's writhing figure. "Hullo! Is that Claridge's Hotel?" Fischer went on. "I am speaking from Giro's. Put me through, if you please, to Miss Van Teyl's apartments... What?
"A rich brother-in-law coming along, eh? ... No, don't do that," stepping quickly backwards as Van Teyl's fist shot out. "Then keep my sister's name out of this conversation," Van Teyl insisted. "If you are wise, you'll clear out altogether. They're at it again." Fischer, however, glanced at the clock and remained. At the next lull, he hung down the tape and turned to his companion.
How far might it not drag him down? There should be a fight, at any rate, he told himself, as an hour or two later he made his way downtown. He paid several calls in the vicinity of Wall Street, and finished up in Van Teyl's office. That young man greeted him with a certain relief. "You know the tone of the market's still against you, Fischer," he warned him once more.
"That's a deal, my little yellow-skinned kid," the valet agreed in a tone of relief. "I'll show you where the things are kept." His new coadjutor bowed. "The telephone is ringing in the master's room," he observed. "You shall remain here, and I will answer it." "That goes, Jappy," the man acquiesced. "If it's a young lady take her name, but don't say that Mr. Van Teyl's about.
It is not I who had the moulding of your brother's character. It is not I who made him a forger and a weakling." Van Teyl's arm was upraised. An oath broke from his lips. Pamela seized him firmly and drew him away. "Be quiet, James," she begged. "Let us hear what Mr. Fischer is going to do about it." "That depends upon you," was the cold reply.
"We shall meet in Washington," Mr. Fischer concluded, with an air of a prophet, as he took his leave. It was within half an hour of closing time that same afternoon when Lutchester walked into James Van Teyl's office. The young man greeted him with some surprise. "Will you do some business for me?" Lutchester asked, without any preliminaries. "Sure!" "How many Anglo-French will you buy for me?
It was such a vividly real Pamela, too, who spoke and walked and moved by his side. His memory failed him nowhere, followed faithfully the kaleidoscopic changes in her face and tone, showed him even that long, grateful, searching glance when their eyes had met in Von Teyl's sitting-room.
"I can't remember anything definitely until I woke up in that chapel," Graham continued, "but when they searched me and found that the pocketbook had gone, Fischer, the big American, muttered some woman's name. I was queer just at the moment, but it sounded very much to me like Miss Van Teyl's. He rang her up on the telephone."
He ignored with passive unconcern the mistake of Van Teyl's attempted greeting. He looked through Fischer as though he had been a ghost. He stood by Sonia's side while she seated herself, and listened with courteous pleasure to her excited admiration of the flowers and the wonderful vista. Then he took his own place. In his right hand he was carrying an evening paper with its flaming headlines.
Fischer threw himself into the client's easy-chair. The furniture in the office seemed less distinct than usual. He was conscious of a certain haziness of outline in everything. Van Teyl's face, even, was shrouded in a little mist.
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