The baronet himself did not at once come to the point. He talked around, hummed and hawed, and at last blurted out the truth.
“Look here, Black,” he said, “you and I have been good pals—we’ve been together in some queer adventures, but now I am going to—I want—”
He stammered and spluttered.
“What do you want?” asked Black with a frown.
“Well, to tell the truth,” said Sir Isaac, with a pathetic attempt to be firm, “I think it is about time that you and I dissolved partnership.”
“What do you mean?” asked Black.
“Well, you know, I’m getting talked about,” said the other disjointedly. “People are spreading lies about me, and one or two chaps recently have asked me what business you and I are engaged in, and—it’s worrying me. Black,” he said with the sudden exasperation of a weak man. “I believe I have lost my chance with Verlond because of my association with you.”
“I see,” said Black.
It was a favourite expression of his. It meant much; it meant more than usual now.
“I understand,” he said, “that you think the ship is sinking, and, ratlike, you imagine it is time to swim to the shore.”
“Don’t be silly, dear old fellow,” protested the other, “and don’t be unreasonable. You see how it is. When I joined you, you were goin’ to do big things—big amalgamations, big trusts, stuffin’ an’ all that sort of thing. Of course,” he admitted apologetically, “I knew all about the bucket-shop, but that was a sideline.”
Black smiled grimly.
“A pretty profitable sideline for you,” he said dryly.
“I know, I know,” said Ikey, patient to an offensive degree, “but it wasn’t a matter of millions an’ all that, now was it?”
Black was thoughtful, biting his nails and looking down at the grass at his feet.
“People are talkin’, dear old fellow,” Tramber went on, “sayin’ the most awful rotten things. You’ve been promisin’ this combination with Sandford’s foundries, you’ve practically issued shares in Amalgamated Foundries of Europe without havin’ the goods.”
“Sandford won’t come in,” said Black, without looking up, “unless I pay him a quarter of a million cash—he’ll take the rest in shares. I want him to take his price in shares.”
“He’s no mug,” said the baronet coarsely. “Old Sandford isn’t a mug—and I’ll bet he’s got Verlond behind him. He’s no mug either.”
There was a long and awkward silence—awkward for Sir Isaac, who had an unaccountable desire to bolt.
“So you want to sneak out of it, do you?” said Black, meeting his eyes with a cold smile.
“Now, my dear old chap,” said Sir Isaac hastily, “don’t take that uncharitable view. Partnerships are always being dissolved, it’s what they’re for,” he said with an attempt at humour. “And I must confess I don’t like some of your schemes.”
“You don’t like!” Black turned round on him with a savage oath. “Do you like the money you’ve got for it? The money paid in advance for touting new clients? The money given to you to settle your debts at the club? You’ve got to go through with it, Ikey, and if you don’t, I’ll tell the whole truth to Verlond and to every pal you’ve got.”
“They wouldn’t believe you,” said Sir Isaac calmly. “You see, my dear chap, you’ve got such an awful reputation, and the worst of having a bad reputation is that no one believes you. If it came to a question of believing you or believing me, who do you think Society would believe—a man of some position, one in the baronetage of Great Britain, or a man—well, not to put too fine a point on it—like you?”
Black looked at him long and steadily.
“Whatever view you take,” he said slowly, “you’ve got to stand your corner. If, as a result of any of the business we are now engaged in, I am arrested, I shall give information to the police concerning you. We are both in the same boat—we sink or swim together.”
He noticed the slow-spreading alarm on Sir Isaac’s face.
“Look here,” he said, “I’ll arrange to pay you back that money I’ve got. I’ll give you bills—”
Black laughed.
“You’re an amusing devil,” he said. “You and your bills! I can write bills myself, can’t I? I’d as soon take a crossing-sweeper’s bills as yours. Why, there’s enough of your paper in London to feed Sandford’s furnaces for a week.”
The words suggested a thought.
“Let’s say no more about this matter till after the amalgamation. It’s coming off next week. It may make all the difference in our fortune, Ikey,” he said in gentler tones. “Just drop the idea of ratting.”
“I’m not ratting,” protested the other. “I’m merely—”
“I know,” said Black. “You’re merely taking precautions—well, that’s all the rats do. You’re in this up to your neck—don’t deceive yourself. You can’t get out of it until I say ‘Go.’ ”
“It will be awkward for me if the game is exposed,” said Sir Isaac, biting his nails. “It will be jolly unpleasant if it is discovered I am standing in with you.”
“It will be more awkward for you,” answered Black ominously, “if, at the psychological moment, you are not standing in with me.”
Theodore Sandford, a busy man, thrust his untidy grey head into the door of his daughter’s sitting-room.
“May,” said he, “don’t forget that I am giving a dinner tonight in your honour—for unless my memory is at fault and the cheque you found on your breakfast-tray was missupplied, you are twenty-two today.”
She blew him a kiss.
“Who is coming?” she asked. “I ought really to have invited everybody myself.”
“Can’t stop to tell you” said her father with a smile. “I’m sorry you quarrelled with young Fellowe. I should like to have asked him.”
She smiled gaily.
“I shall have to get another policeman,” she said.
He looked at her for a long time.
“Fellowe isn’t an ordinary policeman,” he said quietly. “Do you know that I saw him dining with the Home Secretary the other
