Men of Affairs Part 65

"Pity about that pistol," he muttered.

On the road at his feet lay a lady's hand-bag with silk cords. It was part of the equipment furnished by Mrs. Barraclough. Richard stooped and picked it up. There was a barrel of tar and a sand heap by the sign board and it struck him that both might by useful. With all the speed he could command he rolled the tar barrel up the road and left it blocking the way. Then he returned to the sand heap and filled the hand-bag very full and tightened the strings. It felt quite business like as he spun it in the air.

The noise of the oncoming Ford was now plainly detectable, but with it was another sound, a sound that caused him to throw up his head and listen. From the Oxshott road it came, the tump--tump--tump of a single cylinder motor cycle engine. He knew that music very well, had heard it a score of times during his three weeks' imprisonment. The particular ring of the exhaust could not be mistaken.

"That's Laurence's bike for a thousand pounds," he exclaimed and quickly pulled the hood of the cloak over his head.

To guess at the relative distances, the motor cycle should arrive half a minute before the car and banking on the chance, Richard sat down on the heap of sand and waited.

It was Laurence right enough--in evening dress, and hatless, just as he had sprung to the pursuit after at last they succeeded in breaking down the door.

He saw the wrecked motor and what was apparently an old woman huddled at the roadside. He pulled up within a couple of yards and shouted at her.

"Hi! you Madam! seen a car with a man and a girl in it go by?"

But he received no answer even when he shouted the question a second time. The old lady seemed painfully deaf and employing the most regrettable language, Oliver Laurence descended from his mount, leant it against the fence and came nearer to yell his inquiry into her ear.

He did not have time to recover from his surprise, when the voice of Richard Frencham Altar replied: "Yes, I have." The sand-bag descended on the top of his head directed by a full arm swing. A dazzling procession of stars floated before his eyes as though he were plunged into the very heart of the milky-way--flashed and faded into velvet black insensibility.

From behind heralded by a beam of light and the squawk of a horn, came a crash as the Ford Car hit the tar barrel end on. Its front axle went back ten inches and the rear wheels rose upward. Two shadowy forms, that were groundlings at another time, took wings and flew in a neat parabola over the windscreen, striking the metal surface of the road with a single thud. They made no effort to rise, but lay in awkward sprawling att.i.tudes as though in the midst of violent activity they had fallen asleep.

Richard Frencham Altar stood alone, blinking rather stupidly at the havoc he had wrought. It was such a relief when Flora stole out of the shadow of the trees and came toward him.

"What a shemozzle, isn't it?" he said dazedly. "I think we'd better get out of this, don't you?"

He wheeled the motor cycle into the centre of the road and bade her jump up behind.

Folks who were returning home late that night were astonished to see a hatless man with a white unshaved face tearing through the side streets of the south-west district of London on a motor cycle with a pretty, but very dishevelled maiden clinging on to the Flapper bracket and deliriously shouting apparently for no better reason than joy of speed.

An old gentleman who signed himself "Commonsense" wrote to the papers about it next day and expressed his disgust in no measured terms.

CHAPTER 34.

THE FINISHING STRAIGHT.

"Gentlemen," said Mr. Torrington. "We have an important decision to make. Barraclough is on his way home, presumably with the concession in his pocket. Our opponents have made certain dispositions to prevent his safe arrival--those dispositions they are prepared to remove in consideration of a third interest."

Ca.s.sis snorted violently. Actual propinquity with danger, the clash of mind against mind had in a large measure restored his self-possession.

"Preposterous," he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

Hilbert Torrington continued.

"It rests with us to decide whether or no we will accept their terms or take a chance."

"Don't forget the chance is Barraclough," cried Cranbourne, then swinging round on Hipps, he demanded:

"What are the odds against him?"

"Steep," was the laconical rejoinder.

Cranbourne hesitated a bare second.

"Accept their terms," said he.

"In favour?"

"Of course in favour."

Nugent Ca.s.sis shook him by the sleeve.

"I am heartily opposed to their acceptance. It is absurd to suppose that Barraclough is unequal to the task we have set him."

"Against?" queried Mr. Torrington.

"Emphatically against."

When it came to Almont's turn to vote his distress of mind was pathetic. He stood alternatively on one leg and the other. He spoke of "Jolly old public school traditions." He "doubted if the dear old sportsman could endure the idea of being protected at such a cost."

"No, d.a.m.n it all," he concluded. "Why should we split the prize?"

"We can't juggle with men's lives," urged Cranbourne.

"It's insanity to wilt at the last moment," said Ca.s.sis.

Up went Lord Almont's hand.

"I vote against," he said.

Rather piteously Cranbourne appealed to his chief. As Chairman of the board Hilbert Torrington's vote counted as two.

"It rests with you, sir," he said.

The old man nodded and a queer smile played round the corners of his mouth--the smile of a pranky schoolboy.

"But surely," he said. "No one will doubt the course I shall take.

One must always stand by one's colours. I accept the hazard Against."

He moved a pace or two forward and bowed to Van Diest. "Good-evening, Gentlemen."

Until this moment no one had been conscious of Isabel's presence in the room. She had been a silent agonised spectator, controlled by the belief that the value of persons would eventually be proved higher than the value of things. But the cold blooded refusal to protect her lover at the price of a few paltry millions, appalled her beyond bearing.

She ceased to be a pretty child with a shock of curly hair and was transformed into a veritable fury.

"You beasts, you brutes, you torturers!" she cried. "You'd let them kill him without lifting a hand--you--you, ohh!"

Van Diest and the American moved toward the door, but she barred the way.

"Pick up that telephone. You shall have your price."