Part 25 (1/2)

”Now, my friends,” he said, ”welcome to my house! Paul,” he added, turning to me, ”let me introduce my two friends, Mr. Harding and Mr. Densmore--Mr.

Paul Walmsley. Mr. Walmsley has just been returned for the western division of Bedfords.h.i.+re.”

They greeted me with more than affability. Mr. Harding a.s.sured me he had read my speeches. Mr. Densmore thought no one was more to be envied than a man who had the gifts that secured for him a seat in Parliament.

”It's early yet,” Mr. Bundercombe declared genially. ”Let's sit down. Tell me a little about English business. It interests me. You bought those Chilean bonds all right, I see. They are up an eighth to-night.”

”A good purchase, Mr. Bundercombe,” Mr. Harding a.s.sured him; ”a very good purchase! After all, though, there's not much money to be made out of those government things. Now we've a little affair of our own--what do you say, Densmore?” he broke off, looking toward his partner. ”We could afford to let Mr. Bundercombe come in a little way with us, I think?”

Mr. Densmore nodded.

”Not more than five,” he said warningly. ”Remember what you promised the Rothschild people.”

Mr. Harding nodded and crossed his knees. He lit a cigar from the box Mr.

Bundercombe pa.s.sed round.

”This sounds interesting!” the latter remarked. ”I dare say Mr. Walmsley, too, has a little spare money for investment.”

Mr. Densmore sighed, though his eyes were brightening.

”It's too good a thing,” he explained confidentially, ”to let the world into. Between ourselves, there's a fortune in it, and we want to keep it among our friends.”

He drew a dummy prospectus from his vest pocket and began a long-winded recital of some figures in which I was not particularly interested. Mr.

Bundercombe, however, appeared to be greatly impressed by what he heard.

”Gentlemen,” he said, ”there's just one little thing: American business methods and English are different in one respect. In my country we've got a sort of official guide that tells us exactly whom we are dealing with and what their means are. Now I know you are good fellows and it seems to me I'll be glad to go into this little affair with you; but we are strangers financially, aren't we? Now if you were Americans I should say to you: 'What's your rating?' and you'd tell me, because you'd know that I could look it up in a business guide in ten minutes.”

”Perfectly sound,” Mr. Harding admitted--”perfectly! Neither my partner nor I have anything to conceal. Last Christmas we were worth just over sixty thousand pounds and since then we've made a bit.”

”You've no other partner?” Mr. Bundercombe inquired.

”Certainly not!” Mr. Harding replied.

”Then what about our friend Stanley?” Mr. Bundercombe asked quietly.

Almost as he spoke Stanley walked into the middle of the little group. I have never in the whole course of my life seen two men so thoroughly and entirely amazed. Mr. Harding dropped his cigar on the carpet, where he let it remain. They stared at Stanley as though they were looking upon a ghost. Both men seemed somehow to have lost their confident bearing-- seemed to have shrunken into smaller, less a.s.sertive, meaner beings.

”Sixty thousand pounds,” Mr. Bundercombe went on--”one-third of which belongs to Stanley here.”

”Absurd!” Harding faltered.

”Nothing--nothing of the sort!” Densmore declared.

Mr. Bundercombe very carefully lit another cigar. Then he rang the bell.

Harding rose to his feet. He was not looking in the least like the sleek, opulent gentleman who had entered the room a few minutes before.

”What's that for?” he demanded, pointing to the bell.

The door was already opened. Mr. Bundercombe indicated the young lady who stood upon the threshold--the lady with whom he had been lunching that day at Prince's.