Chapter Twenty Two Tells of the Three.

“Well?”

“Weel?” asked Duncan Macgregor, who was seated in an easy attitude in Sam Statham’s library. At the table sat the millionaire himself, while near by, in the enjoyment of a cigar, sat old Levi. The latter was still in his garb of service, but his attitude was certainly more like that of his master’s intimate friend than that of butler.

It was from his thin lips that the query had escaped in response to a fact which the Scot had emphasised with his hairy fist.

“Well,” exclaimed Statham after a pause, “and what do you suppose should be done, Mr—”

“Macgregor—still Duncan Macgregor,” exclaimed the bearded man, concluding the millionaire’s sentence. “That’s the verra thing that puzzles me, mon. P’raps we’d best wait a wee bittie an’ see.”

Levi dissented. He knew that whatever his position in that strange household, his master always listened to him and took his advice—sometimes when it involved the risk of many thousands. He was a kind of oracle, for generally when Ben came there to consult his brother upon some important point, the old servant remained in the room to hear the discussion and to give his dry but candid opinion.

“My own opinion is that we should act at once—without fear. The slightest hesitation now will be our undoing, depend upon it,” he said.

“Ah! Mr Levi,” exclaimed the Scot, “I’m a’ways for caution. Hasna’ our ain Bobbie said that facts are chiels that winna ding, and downa be disputed?”

“Yes; but we’ve not yet quite established the facts yet, you see,” Statham said.

“Why, mon, isn’t it as plain as plain can be? What mair d’ye want?”

“A good deal,” Levi chimed in in his squeaky voice. “We can’t act on that. It’s too shadowy altogether.”

“I tell ye it isn’t!” cried Duncan, shaking his clenched fist again. “Mr Statham is in sair peril, I tell ye he is, an’ I’ve proved it.”

“Mr Statham must be allowed to be the best judge of that,” Levi said, placing his hands together, and holding his cigar between his teeth.

“Mr Statham knows me weel. He knows I’d nae tell him what I didn’t ken ma’sel’.”

The great financier rose thoughtfully and stood with his back to the mantelshelf.

“Look here, Macgregor,” he said, fixing his eyes upon the man seated before him. “When you called at the office and was fool enough not to give your proper name you had a difficulty in getting an interview with me. I hadn’t any idea till I received your note that—well, that you were in the land of the living. When we met before it was under different circumstances—very different, weren’t they?” and the millionaire smiled. “Shall I recall to your memory one scene—long ago—a scene that lives in my memory this moment as though the events happened but yesterday. We were both younger, and more active then—you and I—and—”

“Nae, Mr Statham. We’re better not bearin’ it,” he protested, holding up his hands. “I jalouse what you’re again’ to say.”

“To you, my friend, I owe much,” the old man went on. “The place was in a sun-baked South American city, the time was sunset, fierce and blood-red like the deeds of that never-to-be-forgotten day. There was war—a revolution was in progress, and the Government forces had been that day driven back into the capital followed by us. I remember you, with that great bullet furrow down your cheek and the blood streaming from it as you fought at my side. I see you bear the scar even now.” Then, with a quick movement he pulled up his sleeve and showed on his right forearm a great cicatrice, asking: “Do you remember how I received this?”

“Nae, nae, Mr Statham, enough!” cried the Scot. “Our days of war are long since past. They’ll come again nae mair.”

“You remember how we followed the troops of Hernandez into the capital, shooting and killing as we drove them before us, and how you and I and a few more of the younger bloods made a dash for the Palace to secure the President himself. I recollect the wild excitement of those moments. I was tearing along the street shouting and urging on my men, when of a sudden I found myself surrounded by a dozen soldiers of Hernandez. I fought for life, though well knowing I was lost. As a prisoner I should be tortured, for they had long sworn to serve me as they had served our friends José and Manuel. This recollection flashed across me, and with my back to the wall I fired my pistol full in a man’s face and blew it out of all recognition. A man had raised his rifle and covered me, but next moment I gave him an upward cut with my sword.

“At the same instant I felt a sharp twinge upon my right arm, and my sword dropped from my grasp. I was maimed, and stood there at their mercy. A dark-faced, beetle-browed fellow raised his sabre with a fierce Spanish oath to cut me down, but in the blood-red sunlight another blade flashed high, and the man sank dying in the dust.

“It was you, Macgregor—you alone had come to my aid, and four of my attackers fell beneath your blows in that hand-to-hand struggle as you, with your own body placed before mine, fought on, keeping them back and yet without assistance. Shall I ever forget those moments, or how near both of us were to death? I was already half-fainting, but you shouted to me to keep courage, and in the end we were discovered by our men and saved. If ever a deed deserved the Victoria Cross, yours did. You, Macgregor—as you now call yourself—saved my life.”

“An’ I’m here, Mr Statham, to save it again, if ye’ll only let me,” was the Scot’s dry reply.

“Years have gone since that day,” the millionaire went on, with a distinct catch in his voice. “I lost sight of you soon afterwards, and heard once that you were in Caracas. Then there was no further news of you. We drifted apart—our lives lay in opposite directions. Yet to you—and to you alone—I owe my present life, for were it not for your aid at that moment I should have been put to the torture in that terrible castle where Hernandez did his prisoners to death, and my body given to the rats like others of our friends.”

“Eh, mon, ye really make me blush,” laughed Macgregor. “So please don’t talk of it. That’s all over the noo. Let the past take care of itsel’. We’ve got the present to face.”

“I have never ceased reflecting upon the past,” Sam declared in a rather low and husky voice. “I never dreamed that the man Macgregor, in the employ of the Clyde and Motherwell Works, was the same man to whom I am indebted for my life.”

“Ah! man’s a problem that puzzles the devil hissel’,” laughed Macgregor. “I’d nae ha kenned ye were the Statham I knew out there in the old days till I saw the picture of ye in the Glasgie News one nicht when I bought it at the corner of Polmadie Street on me way hame. An’ there was a biography of ye—which didn’t mention very much. But it was the real Sam Statham—and Sam Statham was my friend of long ago.”

“Most extraordinary!” remarked Levi, who had been smoking quietly and listening to the conversation. “I had so idea of all this!”

“There are many incidents in my career, Levi, of which you are unaware,” remarked his master drily.

“I have no doubt,” retorted the servant in a tone quite as dry as that of his master’s. This was Duncan Macgregor’s first visit to Park Lane, and Levi did not approve of him. He always looked askance at any friend of Mr Samuel’s of the old days. Everybody who had ever known him in the unknown and struggling period, now claimed his acquaintance as his intimate friend, and various and varied were the ruses adopted in order to endeavour to obtain an interview.

He suspected this hairy Scot—whose bravery in his youth had saved Sam’s life—of working for his own ends.

“This is a strange story of yours, Duncan,” remarked the millionaire a few moments later, his eyes fixed upon the seated man—“so strange that I should not believe it, but for one thing.”

“An’ what’s that?”

“Other information in my possession goes to prove that your surmise is actually correct, and that your apprehension has foundation. I know that Adam is in London. I’ve seen him!”

“An’ he’s seen you—eh?” cried Macgregor, starting up in alarm.

“Yes, he’s seen me.”

“Did he speak to ye?”

“No. He watched me through the window from yonder pavement outside.”

A silence fell in that warm room where the blinds were still down to exclude the sun, a silence unbroken save by the buzzing of the flies and the low, solemn ticking of the clock.

At last the Scot spoke.

“He means mischief. Depend on it.”

“I quite believe he does,” Statham admitted.

“That is why we should act at once,” Levi chimed in.

“And perhaps by a premature move spoil the whole of our chance of victory!” remarked the millionaire, very thoughtfully.

“Remember that Adam holds very strong cards in the game,” the butler urged, knocking the ash slowly from his cigar. Surely it was a queer, unusual scene, this conference of three!

“I have suspected something for some time past, Levi,” was his master’s response. “And I took steps to combat my enemies; but, unfortunately, I was not sufficiently wary, and I failed.”

“What, mon!” gasped the man from Glasgow; “ye don’t say ye’re at the mercy of those devils?”

“I tell you, Macgregor, that my position is more insecure than even you believe it to be,” was the response, in a low voice, almost of despair.

Levi and Duncan exchanged glances. The millionaire’s words were somewhat enigmatical, but the truth was apparent. Samuel Statham was in fear of some revelation which could be made by that shabby stranger whom he had seen idling at the Park railings.

“Tell me, Macgregor. Does Adam know you?”

“No.”

“You’ve seen him, and you know him?”

“Perfectly weel. I kept ma eye on him when he didn’t dream that anybody was nigh him.”

“And what you told me in the City you are prepared to stand by?”

The Scot put out his big hands, saying:

“Mr Statham, what I’ve told ye I stick to.”

“Duncan,” said the great man, clasping the hand offered him. “You were my friend once—my best friend—and you will be so again.”

“If ye’ll let me be,” answered the other warmly. Statham could read a man’s innermost character at a glance. He was seldom, if ever, mistaken. He looked into Macgregor’s eyes, and saw truth and friendship there.

As Levi watched the two men his lip curled slightly. He was a cynic, and did not approve of this outburst of sentimentality on the part of his master. Samuel Statham, the man of millions and the controller of colossal interests, should, he declared within himself, be above such an exhibition of his own heart.

“Is it not strange,” remarked Statham, as though speaking to himself, “that you should actually have been engaged in my works without knowing that it was the head of the firm who was indebted to you for his life?”

“Ay, the world’s only a sma’ space, after all,” Duncan replied. “I was apprenticed to the firm, but soon got sick of a humdrum life. So I went out to South America to try ma fortune, an’ we met. After the war I went to Caracas, and then back to Glasgie to the old firm, where I’ve been ever since. I thought that when the new company took the place over I’d be discharged as too old. Indeed, more than once Mr Rolfe has hinted at it.”

“I don’t think you’d need fear that, Duncan. Both you and I recollect scenes set in strong remembrance—scenes that are never to return. I had no idea it was you to whom the creditable work turned out at Glasgow was due until Rolfe told me all about you,” and as he uttered those words a twinge of conscience shot through his mind as he recollected how he had ordered the man to be summarily discharged for daring to seek an interview. And then how, when he had entered his presence, he had handed him something that was far better destroyed. They had indeed destroyed it together.

He saw that Macgregor had no great love for Rolfe, but put it down to the fact that his secretary, being practically in charge of the works, had become out of favour with the men over the question of labour. The Scot had said nothing derogatory regarding Charlie, but merely expressed surprise that he had not been accorded an interview at once. Then he had urged that he had something of importance and of interest to impart.

“Well, you see, Macgregor,” replied the millionaire, half apologetically; “the fact is I have to make it a rule to see nobody. Of course, to old friends, like yourself, I am always accessible, and delighted to have a chat, but if it were known that I received people, I should be besieged here all day long. I make it a rule not to allow anybody here in my house.”

“Why?” asked the Scot, quite unconscious of the gravity of his inquiry. He was in entire ignorance of the strange stories concerning the house wherein he was at that moment. The papers never mentioned them for fear of an action for libel. As far as he had seen there was nothing peculiar or extraordinary about the place. The hall and the library were very handsomely furnished, as befitted the home of one of England’s wealthiest men. The fact that Levi had been called into conference even was not remarkable, for the reason had already been explained to him briefly, in half-a-dozen words.

“But you have your ain circle of good friends here, I suppose?” suggested the Scot, as the great man had not replied to his question.

“No,” replied Statham. “Nobody comes here—nobody enters my door.”

“But why?”

Master and servant exchanged glances. It was a direct question to which it was impossible to give a truthful reply without the revelation of a secret.

And so Samuel Statham lied to his best, humble yet most devoted friend.