Part 23 (2/2)

”It never occurred to you to make any inquiries?”

”Yes, it did,” said Mr. Oxford. ”I did my best to find out from the dealer where he got the pictures from, but he wouldn't tell me. Well, I sort of scented a mystery. Now I've got no professional use for mysteries, and I came to the conclusion that I'd better just let this one alone. So I did.”

”Well, why didn't you keep on leaving it alone?” Priam asked.

”Because circ.u.mstances won't let me. I sold practically all those pictures to Whitney C. Witt. It was all right. Anyhow I thought it was all right. I put Parfitts' name and reputation on their being yours. And then one day I heard from Mr. Witt that on the back of the canvas of one of the pictures the name of the canvas-makers, and a date, had been stamped, with a rubber stamp, and that the date was after your supposed burial, and that his London solicitors had made inquiries from the artist's-material people here, and these people were prepared to prove that the canvas was made after Priam Farll's funeral. You see the fix?”

Priam did.

”My reputation--Parfitts'--is at stake. If those pictures aren't by you, I'm a swindler. Parfitts' name is gone for ever, and there'll be the greatest scandal that ever was. Witt is threatening proceedings. I offered to take the whole lot back at the price he paid me, without any commission. But he won't. He's an old man; a bit of a maniac I expect, and he won't. He's angry. He thinks he's been swindled, and what he says is that he's going to see the thing through. I've got to prove to him that the pictures are yours. I've got to show him what grounds I had for giving my guarantee. Well, to cut a long story short, I've found you, I'm glad to say!”

He sighed again.

”Look here,” said Priam. ”How much has Witt paid you altogether for my pictures?”

After a pause, Mr. Oxford said, ”I don't mind giving you the figure.

He's paid me seventy-two thousand pounds odd.” He smiled, as if to excuse himself.

When Priam Farll reflected that he had received about four hundred pounds for those pictures--vastly less than one per cent, of what the s.h.i.+ny and prosperous dealer had ultimately disposed of them for, the traditional fury of the artist against the dealer--of the producer against the parasitic middleman--sprang into flame in his heart. Up till then he had never had any serious cause of complaint against his dealers. (Extremely successful artists seldom have.) Now he saw dealers, as the ordinary painters see them, to be the authors of all evil! Now he understood by what methods Mr. Oxford had achieved his splendid car, clothes, club, and minions. These things were earned, not by Mr. Oxford, but _for_ Mr. Oxford in dingy studios, even in attics, by shabby industrious painters! Mr. Oxford was nothing but an opulent thief, a grinder of the face of genius. Mr. Oxford was, in a word, the sp.a.w.n of the devil, and Priam silently but sincerely consigned him to his proper place.

It was excessively unjust of Priam. n.o.body had asked Priam to die.

n.o.body had asked him to give up his ident.i.ty. If he had latterly been receiving tens instead of thousands for his pictures, the fault was his alone. Mr. Oxford had only bought and only sold; which was his true function. But Mr. Oxford's sin, in Priam's eyes, was the sin of having been right.

It would have needed less insight than Mr. Oxford had at his disposal to see that Priam Farll was taking the news very badly.

”For both our sakes, _cher maitre_,” said Mr. Oxford persuasively, ”I think it will be advisable for you to put me in a position to prove that my guarantee to Witt was justified.”

”Why for both our sakes?”

”Because, well, I shall be delighted to pay you, say thirty-six thousand pounds in acknowledgment of--er--” He stopped.

Probably he had instantly perceived that he was committing a disastrous error of tact. Either he should have offered nothing, or he should have offered the whole sum he had received less a small commission. To suggest dividing equally with Priam was the instinctive impulse, the fatal folly, of a born dealer. And Mr. Oxford was a born dealer.

”I won't accept a penny,” said Priam. ”And I can't help you in any way.

I'm afraid I must go now. I'm late as it is.”

His cold resistless fury drove him forward, and, without the slightest regard for the amenities of clubs, he left the table, Mr. Oxford, becoming more and more the dealer, rose and followed him, even directed him to the gigantic cloak-room, murmuring the while soft persuasions and pacifications in Priam's ear.

”There may be an action in the courts,” said Mr. Oxford in the grand entrance hall, ”and your testimony would be indispensable to me.”

”I can have nothing to do with it. Good-day!”

The giant at the door could scarce open the gigantic portal quickly enough for him. He fled--fled, surrounded by nightmare visions of horrible publicity in a law-court. Unthinkable tortures! He d.a.m.ned Mr.

Oxford to the nethermost places, and swore that he would not lift a finger to save Mr. Oxford from penal servitude for life.

<script>