“It shall be red!” he said hoarsely.
The man bowed and opened the door of the car.
Bartholomew had regained a little of his self-assurance by the time he stood before the men.
He was not unused to masked tribunals. There had been one such since his elevation to the Inner Council.
But these four men were in evening dress, and the stagey setting that had characterized the Red Hundred’s Court of Justice was absent. There was no weird adjustment of lights, or tollings of bells, or partings of sombre draperies. None of the cheap trickery of the Inner Council.
The room was evidently a drawing-room, very much like a hundred other drawing-rooms he had seen.
The four men who sat at equal distance before him were sufficiently ordinary an appearance save for their masks. He thought one of them wore a beard, but he was not sure. This man did most of the speaking.
“I understand,” he said smoothly, “you have chosen the red.”
“You seem to know a great deal about my private affairs,” replied Bartholomew.
“You have chosen the red—again?” said the man.
“Why—again?” demanded the prisoner.
The masked man’s eyes shone steadily through the holes in the mask.
“Years ago,” he said quietly, “there was an officer who betrayed his country and his comrades.”
“That is an old lie.”
“He was in charge of a post at which was stored a great supply of foodstuffs and ammunition,” the mask went on. “There was a commandant of the enemy who wanted those stores, but had not sufficient men to rush the garrison.”
“An old lie,” repeated Bartholomew sullenly.
“So the commandant hit upon the ingenious plan of offering a bribe. It was a risky thing, and in nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand, it would have been a futile business. Indeed, I am sure that I am understating the proportion—but the wily old commandant knew his man.”
“There is no necessity to continue,” said Bartholomew.
“No correspondence passed,” Manfred went on; “our officer was too cunning for that, but it was arranged that the officer’s answer should be conveyed thus.”
He opened his hand and Bartholomew saw two beans, one red and the other black, reposing in the palm.
“The black was to be a refusal, the red an acceptance, the terms were to be scratched on the side of the red bean with a needle—and the sum agreed was £1,000.”
Bartholomew made no answer.
“Exactly that sum we offer you to place us from time to time in possession of such information as we require concerning the movements of the Red Hundred.”
“If I refuse?”
“You will not refuse,” replied the mask calmly; “you need the money, and you have even now under consideration a plan for cutting yourself adrift from your friends.”
“You know so much—” began the other with a shrug.
“I know a great deal. For instance, I know that you contemplate immediate flight—by the way, are you aware that the Lucus Woerhmann is in dock at Naples with a leaking boiler?”
Bartholomew started, as well he might, for nobody but himself knew that the Lucus Woerhmann was the ship he had hoped to overtake at Suez.
Manfred saw his bewilderment and smiled.
“I do not ask credit for supernatural powers,” he said; “frankly, it was the merest guesswork, but you must abandon your trip. It is necessary for our greater success that you should remain.”
Bartholomew bit his lips. This scheme did not completely fall in with his plans. He affected a sudden geniality.
“Well, if I must, I must,” he said heartily, “and since I agree, may I ask whom I have the honour of addressing, and further, since I am now your confidential agent, that I may see the faces of my employers?”
He recognized the contempt in Manfred’s laugh.
“You need no introduction to us,” said Manfred coldly, “and you will understand we do not intend taking you into our confidence. Our agreement is that we share your confidence, not that you shall share ours.”
“I must know something,” said Bartholomew doggedly. “What am I to do? Where am I to report? How shall I be paid?”
“You will be paid when your work is completed.” Manfred reached out his hand toward a little table that stood within his reach.
Instantly the room was plunged into darkness.
The traitor sprang back, fearing he knew not what.
“Come—do not be afraid,” said a voice.
“What does this mean?” cried Bartholomew, and stepped forward.
He felt the floor beneath him yield and tried to spring backwards, but already he had lost his balance, and with a scream of terror he felt himself falling, falling. …
“Here, wake up!”
Somebody was shaking his arm and he was conscious of an icy coldness and a gusty raw wind that buffeted his face.
He shivered and opened his eyes.
First of all he saw an iron camel with a load on its back; then he realized dimly that it was the ornamental support of a garden seat; then he saw a dull grey parapet of grimy stone. He was sitting on a seat on the Thames Embankment, and a policeman was shaking him, not ungently, to wakefulness.
“Come along, sir—this won’t do, ye know.”
He staggered to his feet unsteadily. He was wearing a fur coat that was not his.
“How did I come here?” he asked in a dull voice.
The policeman laughed good humouredly.
“Ah, that’s more than I can tell you—you weren’t here ten minutes ago, that I’ll swear.”
Bartholomew put his hand in his pocket and found some money.
“Call me a taxi,” he said shakily and one was found.
He left the policeman perfectly satisfied with the result of his morning’s work and drove home to his lodgings. By what extraordinary means had he reached the Embankment? He remembered the Four, he remembered the suddenly darkened room, he remembered falling—Perhaps he lost consciousness, yet he could not have been injured by his fall. He had a faint recollection of somebody telling him to breathe and of inhaling a sweet sickly vapour—and that was all.
The coat was not his. He thrust his hands into both
