Bones in London Part 43

"Sir," he said, "the telephonic apparatus demands conversation."

Bones was glad of the interruption, and, with a muttered apology to his gratified guest, he strode out into the hall. Ali had accustomed himself to answering the telephone, but this time he had not understood the preliminary inquiry from exchange.

"h.e.l.lo!" said Bones into the transmitter.

"Who's that?"

At the sound of the voice which answered him he nearly dropped the receiver.

"Is that Mr. Tibbetts?"

"Yes," said Bones hoa.r.s.ely, and his heart beat a wild rataplan.

"I'm speaking from York, Mr. Tibbetts. I wanted to tell you that the key of the safe is in the drawer of my desk--the top drawer."

"That's all right, dear old--dear Mrs. Hyane."

"What is that you say?" asked the voice sharply.

"Congratulations, dear old missus," said Bones. "Hope you'll be awfully happy on your plantation."

"What do you mean?" asked the voice. "Did you call me Mrs. Hyane?"

"Yes," said Bones huskily.

He heard her laugh.

"How ridiculous you are! Did you really think I would ever marry my cousin?"

"But haven't you?" yelled Bones.

"What--married? Absurd! I'm going to Scotland to see about some family matter."

"You're not--not a Mrs.?" asked Bones emphatically.

"And never will be," said the girl. "What does it all mean? Tell me."

Bones drew a long breath.

"Come back by the next train, young miss," he said. "Let that jolly old family affair go to blazes. I'll meet you at the station and tell you everything."

"But--but----" said the girl.

"Do as you're told, young miss!" roared Bones, and hung up the receiver with a seraphic smile.

The door of his study was a thick one, and it was, moreover, protected from outside noises by a large baize door, and the student of men had heard nothing. Bones strode back into the room with a face so changed that Mr. Hyane could not but observe that something remarkable had happened.

"I'm afraid I'm keeping you up, Mr. Tibbetts," he said.

"Not at all," said Bones cheerfully. "Let's have a look at that cheque I gave you."

The other hesitated.

"Let me have a look at it," said Bones, and Mr. Hyane, with a smile, took it from his pocket and handed it to the other.

"Half for you and half for her, eh, dear old thing?" said Bones, and tore the cheque in two. "That's your half," he said, handing one portion to Mr. Hyane.

"What the devil are you doing?" demanded the other angrily, but Bones had him by the collar, and was kicking him along the all-too-short corridor.

"Open the door, Ali!" said Bones. "Open it wide, dear old heathen!

Ooff!"

The "Ooff!" was accompanied by one final lunge of Bones's long legs.

At midnight Bones was sitting on the platform at King's Cross, alternately smoking a large pipe and singing tuneless songs. They told him that the next train from York would not arrive until three in the morning.

"That doesn't worry me, old thing. I'll wait all night."

"Expecting somebody, sir?" asked the inquisitive porter.

"Everybody, my dear old uniformed official," said Bones, "everybody!"

CHAPTER XII

BONEs. .h.i.tS BACK

It may be said of Bones that he was in the City, but not of it. Never once had he been invited by the great and awe-inspiring men who dominate the finance of the City to partic.i.p.ate in any of those adventurous undertakings which produce for the adventurers the fabulous profits about which so much has been written. There were times when Bones even doubted whether the City knew he was in it.

He never realised his own insignificance so poignantly as when he strolled through the City streets at their busiest hour, and was unrecognised even by the bareheaded clerks who dashed madly in all directions, carrying papers of tremendous importance.

The indifference of the City to Mr. Tibbetts and his partner was more apparent than real. It is true that the great men who sit around the green baize cloth at the Bank of England and arrange the bank rate knew not Bones nor his work. It is equally true that the very important personages who occupy suites of rooms in Lombard Street had little or no idea of his existence. But there were men, and rich and famous men at that, who had inscribed the name of Bones in indelible ink on the tablets of their memory.

The Pole Brothers were shipbrokers, and had little in common, in their daily transactions, with Mr. Harold de Vinne, who specialised in industrial stocks, and knew little more about ships than could be learnt in an annual holiday trip to Madeira. Practically there was no bridge to connect their intellects. Sentimentally, life held a common cause, which they discovered one day, when Mr. Fred Pole met Mr. Harold de Vinne at lunch to discuss a matter belonging neither to the realms of industrialism nor the mercantile marine, being, in fact, the question of Mr. de Vinne leasing or renting Mr. Pole's handsome riverside property at Maidenhead for the term of six months.

They might not have met even under these circ.u.mstances, but for the fact that some dispute arose as to who was to pay the gardener. That matter had been amicably settled, and the two had reached the coffee stage of their luncheon, when Mr. de Vinne mentioned the inadvisability--as a rule--of discussing business matters at lunch, and cited a deplorable happening when an interested eavesdropper had overheard certain important negotiations and had most unscrupulously taken advantage of his discovery.

"One of these days," said Mr. de Vinne between his teeth, "I'll be even with that gentleman." (He did not call him a gentleman.) "I'll give him Tibbetts! He'll be sorry he was ever born."

"Tibbetts?" said Mr. Fred Pole, sitting bolt upright. "Not Bones?"

The other nodded and seemed surprised.

"You don't know the dear fellow, do you?" he asked, only he did not use the expression "dear fellow."

"Know him?" said Mr. Fred, taking a long breath. "I should jolly well say I did know him. And my brother Joe knows him. That fellow----"