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Updated: May 5, 2025
"I'd like to give her something," he said. "How much do you think?" Mr. Windlebird perpended. "I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll send my own lawyer to her with say, a thousand pounds not a check, you understand, but one thousand golden sovereigns that he can show her roll about on the table in front of her eyes. That'll console her. It's wonderful, the effect money in the raw has on people."
The Napoleonic features were lightened by that rare, indulgent smile. "Not so fast, young man," laughed Mr. Windlebird. "Getting into Wildcat Reefs isn't quite so easy as you seem to think. Shall we say that you propose to invest thirty thousand pounds? Yes? Very well, then. Thirty thousand pounds!
Mr. Windlebird always spoke the truth when he could. He spoke it now. It seemed to Roland, as the days went by, that nothing could mar the pleasant, easy course of life at the Windlebirds. The fine weather, the beautiful garden, the pleasant company all these things combined to make this sojourn an epoch in his life.
He was a philosopher, but he could not help feeling a little galled that the demand which had destroyed him had been so trivial. He had handled millions on paper, it was true, but still millions and here he was knocked out of time by a paltry twenty thousand pounds. "Are you absolutely sure that nothing can be done?" persisted Mrs. Windlebird. "Have you tried every one?"
Wildcat Reefs were a standing joke except to the unfortunate few who still held any of the shares. "The thing will have to be done very cautiously. No one must know. But I think I say I think I can manage it for you." "You're awfully kind, Mr. Windlebird." "Not at all, my dear boy, not at all. As a matter of fact, I shall be doing a very good turn to another pal of mine at the same time."
Windlebird, keen student of the illustrated press, had recognized Roland by his photograph in the Daily Mirror. In the course of the twenty yards' walk from house to tennis-lawn she had put her husband into possession of the more salient points in Roland's history. It was when Mr. Windlebird heard that Roland had forty thousand pounds in the bank that he sat up and took notice.
Edwards a few months before, he tore the check into little pieces. "I couldn't accept it, Mrs. Windlebird," he said. "I can't tell you how deeply I appreciate your wonderful kindness, but I really couldn't. I bought the shares with my eyes open. The whole thing is nobody's fault, and I can't let you suffer for it. After the way you have treated me here, it would be impossible.
What hidden strings he pulled, what levers he used, Roland did not know. All Roland knew was that somehow, by some subtle means, Mr. Windlebird brought it off. Two days later his host handed him twenty thousand one-pound shares in the Wildcat Reef Gold-mine. "There, my boy," he said. "It's awfully kind of you, Mr. Windlebird." "My dear boy, don't mention it. If you're satisfied, I'm sure I am."
As a matter of fact, he never went near it. And why should he? It's down in South America somewhere. Awful climate snakes, mosquitoes, revolutions, fever." Mr. Windlebird spoke drowsily. His eyes closed. "Well, the Argus people say that they have sent a man of their own out there to make inquiries, a well-known expert, and the report will be in within the next fortnight.
If he had been looking at his hostess then, an action which he was strenuously avoiding, he might have seen a curious spasm pass over her face. Mrs. Windlebird turned very pale and sat down suddenly in the chair which Roland had vacated at the beginning of their conversation. She lay back in it with her eyes closed. She looked tired and defeated. Roland took the paper mechanically.
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