The Sins of Severac Bablon Part 21

As the key turned in the lock, and the dim footsteps sounded upon the stair, he lurched unsteadily to his feet, and, stooping, picked up the card.

Simons, his man, returned half an hour later, having been detained in his favourite saloon by a chance acquaintance who had conceived a delirious pa.s.sion for his society. He found his master locked in the study--with the key on the wrong side--and, furthermore, in the grip of apoplexy, with a crumpled visiting-card crushed in his clenched right hand.

CHAPTER XI

MR. SANRACK VISITS THE HOTEL ASTORIA

Mr. J. J. Oppner and his daughter sat at breakfast the next morning at the Astoria. Oppner was deeply interested in the _Gleaner_.

"Zoe," he said suddenly. "This is junk--joss--ponk!"

His voice had a tone quality which suggested that it had pa.s.sed through hot sand.

Zoe looked up. Zoe Oppner was said to be the prettiest girl in the United States. Allowing that discount necessary in the case of John Jacob Oppner's daughter, Zoe still was undeniably very pretty indeed.

She looked charming this morning in a loose wrap from Paris, which had cost rather more than an ordinary, fairly well-to-do young lady, residing, say, at Hampstead, expends upon her entire toilette in twelve months.

"What's that, Pa?" she inquired.

"What but this Severac Bablon business!"

a.s.sisted by her father, she had diligently searched that morning through stacks of daily papers for news of the robbery in Victoria Street. But in vain.

"Guess it's a false alarm, Zoe!" Mr. Oppner had drawled, in his dusty fashion. "Some humorist got a big hustle on him last night. Like enough Mr. Megger was guyed by the same comic that sent _me_ on a pie-chase!"

Zoe thought otherwise, preferring to believe that Inspector Pepys had suppressed the news; now she wondered if, after all, they had overlooked it.

"Is there something about Severac Bablon in the paper?" she asked interestedly. "_I_ can't find anything."

"Nope?" drawled Oppner. "Nope? H'm! Then what about all this front page, with Julius Rohscheimer sitting in his _pie_-jams and the Marquess of Evershed talking at him? Ain't that Severac Bablon? Sure! Did you think that Julius found it good for his health to part up a cool hundred thou.? And look at Hague up in the corner--and Elschild in the other corner! There's only one way to open the cheque-books of either of them guys; with a gun!"

"Oh!" cried Zoe--"how exciting!"

"I'm with you," drawled her father. "It's as thrilling as having all your front teeth out."

"Do you mean, Pa, that this is something to do with the card----"

"There's me and Jesson to sh.e.l.l out yet. That's what I mean! He's raised two hundred thousand. I'm richer'n any of 'em and he'll mulct me on my Canadian investments for the balance of half a million! Or maybe he'll split it between me and Jesson and Hohsmann!"

"Oh!" said Zoe, "what a pity! And I was going to ask you to buy me two new hats!"

Her father looked at her long and earnestly.

"You haven't got any proper kind of balance where money is concerned, Zoe," he drawled. "Your brain pod ain't burstin' with financial genius.

You don't seem to care worth a baked bean that I'm bein' fleeced of thousands! That hog Bablon cleaned me out a level million dollars when he burned the Runek Mills, and now I know, plain as if I saw him, he's got me booked for another pile! Where d'you suppose money comes from?

D'you think I can grab out like a coin manipulator, and my hand comes back full of dollars?"

Zoe made no reply. She was staring, absently, over her father's head, into a dream-world. Had Mr. Oppner been endowed with the power to read from another's eyes, he would have found a startling story written in the beautiful book fringed by Zoe's dark lashes. She was thinking of Severac Bablon; thinking of him, not as a felon, but as he had been depicted to her by the strange man whom she had met at Lord Vignoles'--the man who pursued him, yet condoned his sins.

Her father's sandy voice broke in upon her reverie:

"Where I'm tied up--same with Rohscheimer and the rest--I don't know this thief Bablon when I see him."

"No," said Zoe. "Of course."

Mr. Oppner stared. His daughter's att.i.tude was oddly unemotional, wholly detached and impersonal.

"H'm!" he grunted dryly. "I've got to see Alden, the Agency boy, upstairs. I'll be pushing off."

He "pushed off."

Almost immediately afterwards, Zoe's maid entered. There was a gentleman to see her. He would not give his card.

"Show him into the next room," said Zoe, full of excitement, "and if Mr.

Oppner comes back, tell him I am engaged."

She entered the cosy reception-room, feeling that she was about to be admitted behind the scenes, and, woman-like, delightfully curious. A moment later, her visitor arrived.

"I have kept my promise, Miss Oppner!"

She turned, to greet him--and a little, quick cry escaped her.

For this was not Detective-Inspector Pepys who stood, smiling, in the doorway!

It was a man who was, or who seemed to be, taller than he; a slim man, having but one thing in common with the detective: his black morning-coat fitted him as perfectly as the dress-coat had fitted the inspector. An irreproachably attired man is a greater rarity than most people realise; and Zoe Oppner wondered why, even in that moment of amazement, she noted this fact.

Her visitor was singularly handsome. She knew, instantly, that she had never seen one so handsome before. He was of a puzzling type, wholly unlike any European she had met, though no darker of complexion than many Americans. With his waving black hair, extraordinarily perfect features, and the light of conscious power in his large eyes, he awoke something within her that was half memory--yet not wholly so.

She was vaguely afraid, but strongly attracted towards this mysterious stranger.

"But," she said, staring the while as one fascinated, "you--are not Inspector Pepys!"

"True!" he answered smilingly. "I am not Inspector Pepys; nor is there any such person!"

The voice was different, yet somehow reminiscent. Only now, a faint, indefinable accent had crept into it.

"What do you mean?"

Zoe, at the idea that she had been imposed upon, grew regally indignant.

She was a lovely woman, and accustomed to the homage which mankind pays to beauty. Her naturally frank, laughter-loving nature made her a charming companion; but she could be distant, scornful--could crush the most presumptuous with a glance of her eyes.

Now she looked at her strange visitor with frigid dignity, and he merely smiled amusedly, as one smiles at a pretty child.

"Be good enough to explain yourself. If you dared to impose upon Lady Vignoles last night--if you are not really a detective--what are you?"

"That question would take too long to answer, Miss Oppner!"