The Masquerader Part 10

"A telegram, sir," he said. "And the boy wishes to know if there is an answer." Picking up Chilcote's handkerchief, he turned aside with elaborate dignity.

Chilcote's hands were so unsteady that he could scarcely insert his finger under the flap of the envelope. Tearing off a corner, he wrenched the covering apart and smoothed out the flimsy pink paper.

The message was very simple, consisting of but seven words:

"Shall expect you at eleven to-night.-LODER."

He read it two or three times, then he looked up. "No answer," he said, mechanically; and to his own ears the relief in his voice sounded harsh and unnatural.

Exactly as the clocks chimed eleven Chilcote mounted the stairs to Loder's rooms. But this time there was more of haste than of uncertainty in his steps, and, reaching the landing, he crossed it in a couple of strides and knocked feverishly on the door.

It opened at once, and Loder stood before him.

The occasion was peculiar. For a moment neither spoke; each involuntarily looked at the other with new eyes and under changed conditions. Each had a.s.sumed a fresh stand-point in the other's thought.

The pa.s.sing astonishment, the half-impersonal curiosity that had previously tinged their relationship, was cast aside, never to be rea.s.sumed. In each, the other saw himself--and something more.

As usual, Loder was the first to recover himself.

"I was expecting you," he said. "Won't you come in?"

The words were almost the same as his words of the night before, but his voice had a different ring; just as his face, when he drew back into the room, had a different expression--a suggestion of decision and energy that had been lacking before. Chilcote caught the difference as he crossed the threshold, and for a bare second a flicker of something like jealousy touched him. But the sensation was fleeting.

"I have to thank you!" he said, holding out his hand. He was too well bred to show by a hint that he understood the drop in the other's principles. But Loder broke down the artifice.

"Let's be straight with each other, since everybody else has to be deceived," he said, taking the other's hand. "You have nothing to thank me for, and you know it. It's a touch of the old Adam. You tempted me, and I fell." He laughed, but below the laugh ran a note of something like triumph--the curious triumph of a man who has known the tyranny of strength and suddenly appreciates the freedom of a weakness.

"You fully realize the thing you have proposed?" he added, in a different tone. "It's not too late to retract, even now."

Chilcote opened his lips, paused, then laughed in imitation of his companion; but the laugh sounded forced.

"My dear fellow," he said at last, "I never retract."

"Never?"

"No."

"Then the bargain's sealed."

Loder walked slowly across the room, and, taking up his position by the mantel-piece, looked at his companion. The similarity between them as they faced each other seemed abnormal, defying even the closest scrutiny. And yet, so mysterious is Nature even in her lapses, they were subtly, indefinably different. Chilcote was Loder deprived of one essential: Loder, Chilcote with that essential bestowed. The difference lay neither in feature, in coloring, nor in height, but in that baffling, illusive inner illumination that some call individuality, and others soul.

Something of this idea, misted and tangled by nervous imagination, crossed Chilcote's mind in that moment of scrutiny, but he shrank from it apprehensively.

"I--I came to discuss details," he said, quickly, crossing the s.p.a.ce that divided him from his host. "Shall we--? Are you--?" He paused uneasily.

"I'm entirely in your hands." Loder spoke with abrupt decision. Moving to the table, he indicated a chair, and drew another forward for himself.

Both men sat down.

Chilcote leaned forward, resting elbows on the table. "There will be several things to consider--" he began, nervously, looking across at the other.

"Quite so." Loder glanced back appreciatively. "I thought about those things the better part of last night. To begin with, I must study your handwriting. I guarantee to get it right, but it will take a month."

"A month!"

"Well, perhaps three weeks. We mustn't make a mess of things."

Chilcote shifted his position.

"Three weeks!" he repeated. "Couldn't you--?"

"No; I couldn't." Loder spoke authoritatively. "I might never want to put pen to paper, but, on the other hand, I might have to sign a check one day." He laughed. "Have you ever thought of that?--that I might have to, or want to, sign a check?"

"No. I confess that escaped me."

"You risk your fortune that you, may keep the place it bought for you?"

Loder laughed again. "How do you know that I am not a blackguard?" he added. "How do you know that I won't clear out one day and leave you high and dry? What is to prevent John Chilcote from realizing forty or fifty thousand pounds and then making himself scarce?"

"You won't do that," Chilcote said, with unusual decision. "I told you your weakness last night; and it wasn't money. Money isn't the rock you'll split over."

"Then you think I'll split upon some rock? But that's beyond the question. To get to business again. You'll risk my studying your signature?"

Chilcote nodded.

"Right! Now item two." Loder counted on his: fingers. "I must know the names and faces of your men friends as far as I can. Your woman friends don't count. While I'm you, you will be adamant." He laughed again pleasantly. "But the men are essential--the backbone of the whole business."

"I have no men friends. I don't trust the idea of friendship."

"Acquaintances, then."

Chilcote looked up sharply. "I think we score there," he said. "I have a reputation for absent-mindedness that will carry you anywhere. They tell me I can look through the most substantial man in the House as if he were gossamer, though I may have lunched with him the same day."

Loder smiled. "By Jove!" he exclaimed. "Fate Must have been constructing this before either of us was born. It dovetails ridiculously. But I must know your colleagues--even if it's only to cut them. You'll have to take me to the House."

"Impossible!"

"Not at all!" Again the tone of authority fell to Loder. "I can pull my hat over my eyes and turn up my coat-collar. n.o.body will notice me.

We can choose the fall of the afternoon. I promise you 'twill be all right."

"Suppose the likeness should leak out? It's a risk."

Loder laughed confidently. "Tush, man! Risk is the salt of life. I must see you at your post, and I must see the men you work with." He rose, walked across the room, and took his pipe from the rack. "When I go in for a thing, I like to go in over head and ears," he added, as he opened his tobacco-jar.

His pipe filled, he resumed his seat, resting his elbows on the table in unconscious imitation of Chilcote.

"Got a match?" he said, laconically, holding out his band.

In response Chilcote drew his match-box from his pocket and struck a light. As their hands touched, an exclamation escaped him.

"By Jove!" he said, with a fretful mixture of disappointment and surprise. "I hadn't noticed that!" His eyes were fixed in annoyed interest on Loder's extended hand.