Swirling Waters Part 24

Olive reflected that Riviere might not want to see her, in view of the way he had avoided her so far. She answered: "Ring me up on the 'phone when he's in your office. I'll speak to him over the wire."

"Right--I'll remember.... By the way, about the Hudson Bay company, did I tell you that the underwriting negotiations are going through fine?

Inside a week we ought to be ready for flotation."

Larssen proceeded to enlarge on the subject, and the broken thread of Olive's avowal was not taken up again. They left the offices, and drove back to the Cabaret to rejoin Sir Francis.

CHAPTER XX

BEATEN TO EARTH

At eleven o'clock the next morning, the shipowner was at the horseshoe desk in his throne-room, fingering the snapshot of Riviere which Sylvester had secured at Nimes. He had seen in it the picture of a man very like Clifford Matheson, but not for a moment had he thought of it as the portrait of the financier himself. The shaven lip, the scar across the forehead, the differences of hair and collar and tie and dress had combined to make a thorough disguise.

Yet when the visitor entered by the farther door of the throne-room and came striding resolutely down the thirty yards of carpet, Lars Larssen knew him. The carriage and walk were Matheson's.

For a moment hot rage possessed him. Not at Matheson, but at himself. He ought to have guessed before. This was the one possibility he had completely overlooked. Matheson had tricked him by shamming death. He ought not to have let himself be tricked. That was inexcusable.

A moment later he had regained mastery of himself, and a succession of plans flashed past his mental vision, to be considered with lightning speed. The financier held the whip-hand--and the whip must be torn from him ... somehow.

"Sit down, Matheson," said the shipowner calmly, when his antagonist had reached the horseshoe desk.

Neither man offered to shake hands.

Matheson took the seat indicated, and waited for Larssen to begin.

Larssen knew the value of silence, however, and Matheson was forced to open.

"You thought me dead?" he asked.

"I knew you had disappeared for private reasons of your own. I discovered those reasons, and so I respected your privacy," was the calm reply.

"You had the cool intention of using my name in the Hudson Bay prospectus as though I had given you sanction for it."

"You did give me sanction."

"Written?"

"No; your word."

"When?"

"At our last interview at your Paris office. You pa.s.sed your word--an Englishman's word--and I took it."

Matheson ignored the cool lie. "Let's get down to business," he said.

"With pleasure. What do you want?"

"When we last met," continued Matheson slowly, "I wanted you to a.s.sign half of your four million Deferred Shares to Lord ----, to be held in trust for the general body of shareholders. Well, now--_now_--I want the whole four million a.s.signed."

"And you propose that I should give them up for nothing?" queried Larssen ironically.

"For 200,000 in ordinary shares. The monetary value is the same. The difference would be that you'll have two hundred thousand with your own money, not the British public's."

There was silence while the two men eyed one another relentlessly. At the side of Larssen's forehead, under the temple, a tiny vein throbbed and jerked. That was the only outward sign of the feelings of murder which lay in his heart.

"You have your nerve!" he commented.

"I'm offering you easy terms."

"Offer _me_ terms!"

"Easy terms," repeated Matheson. "I could, if I chose, step from here to my lawyers' and have you indicted for conspiracy. I could get you seven to ten years. I could have you breaking stones at Portland."

"Then why don't you?"

"I have my private reasons."

"One of them being that you haven't a shred of evidence," was the cool reply.

"Who sends cables in my name to my managers?" demanded Matheson.

"I know nothing of that."

"You _do_ know it. One of your employees sends them."

"Have you such a cable with you?"

Matheson ignored the retort. "You've told my wife and my father-in-law that I was alive."

"I knew you _were_ alive. Is that your idea of fraud?"

"I'm not going to quibble over words. Believing me to be dead, you had me impersonated, planning to use my name on the Hudson Bay scheme."

"I've not used your name."

"You used it to induce St Aubyn and Carleton-Wingate to come on the Board."

"If you're thinking to prove that, you merely waste your time. The negotiations were carried out by your father-in-law."

"You used my name to a reporter on the _Europe Chronicle_."

"Have you written evidence of that?"

"Martin will swear to it, if necessary."

Larssen laughed harshly. "An out-of-elbows reporter on a sensational yellow journal! Do you dream for one instant that his word would stand against mine in a court of law? See here, Matheson, you'd better go back and read over your brief with the man who's instructing you. He's muddled up the facts."