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Page 46
He could have sworn that the eyes of Breede's daughter gleamed with cold
anticipatory malice. He shuddered for Breede. And he wished Tommy
Hollins well of his bargain. Flirt, indeed! All alike!
"Chubbins!" called the unconscious father from afar.
"Yes, Pops!" She gripped his hand with a well-muscled fervour. "Oh,
he'll have another in a little while, don't you worry!" And she was off,
with this evil in her heart, to a father but now convalescent.
Marvelling, he walked on to the Demon's ambuscade. She pounced upon him
from behind a half-opened door.
"I want to say one word, young man. Oh, you needn't think I don't see
the way things are going. I'm not blind if I am seventy-six! If you're
the tender and innocent thing you say you are, you look out for
yourself. I know you all! If you don't break out one time you do
another. I'd a good deal rather you'd had it over before now and put it
all behind you--don't interrupt--but you're sound and clean as far as I
can see, and you've got a good situation. I don't say it couldn't be
worse. But if you are--well, you see that you _stay_ that way. Don't try
to tell me. I've seen enough of men in my time--"
He broke away from her at Breede's call. The flapper jerked her head
twice at him, very neatly, as the car passed the tennis court. She was
beginning a practise volley with Tommy Hollins, who was disporting
himself like a young colt.
"Chubbins!" he thought. Not a bad name for her, though it had come
queerly from Breede. For the first time he was pricked with the needle
of suspicion that Hollins might not be the right man for the flapper.
Hearing her called "Chubbins" somehow made it seem different. Maybe
Hollins, who seemed all of twenty, wouldn't "make her happy." He thought
it was something that the family ought to consider very seriously. He
was conscious of a willingness to consider it himself, as a friend of
the family and a well-wisher of Chubbins.
* * * * *
He was back in the apartment and in the presence of a document that
swept his mind of all Breedes. Never had he in fancy ceased to be king
Ram-tah, cheated of historic mention because of his wisdom and goodness.
He had looked commiseratingly upon Breede's country-house, thinking of
his own palace on the banks of the slow-moving Nile. "--probably made
this place look like a shack!" he had exultantly thought. And the benign
monarch had ended his reign in peace, to be laid magnificently away, to
repose undisturbed while the sands drifted over him--until--
The hour had come. "My men have succeeded, after incredible hardships,"
wrote Professor Balthasar. "The _goods_ will be delivered to you
Thursday night, the tenth. I trust the final payment will be ready, as,
relying on your honour, I have advanced--"
The rest did not matter. His honour was surely to be relied upon. The
money had been richly earned. An able man, this Balthasar! He had
achieved the thing with admirable secrecy. Bean had feared the hounds of
the daily press. They might discover who It was, to whom It was going;
discover the true identity of Bunker Bean. The whole thing might come
out in the papers! But Balthasar had known how. He approved the caution
that had led him to speak of "the _goods_"; there was something almost
witty about it.
He leaned far out a window, listening, straining his eyes up and down
the lighted avenue. There was confusion in his mind as to how It could
most fittingly be brought to him. The sable vision of a hearse drawn by
four lordly black horses at first possessed his mind. But this was
dismissed; there was no death! And the spectacle would excite comment.
The idea of an ambulance, which he next considered, seemed equally
impracticable. It would have to be done quietly; Balthasar would know.
Trust Balthasar!
He heard the rhythmic clump-clump of a horse's hoofs on the asphalt
pavement. This was presently accompanied by the sounds of wheels. An
express wagon came under the street-lights. Balthasar rode beside the
driver, his frock coat and glossy tall hat having been relinquished for
the garb of an ordinary citizen. Back of them in the wagon he could
distinguish the lines of an Object. It had come to him in a common
express wagon, in a common crate, and the driver did not even wear a
black mask. Balthasar had cunningly eluded detection by pretending there
was nothing to conceal.
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