The Talleyrand Maxim, J. S. Fletcher [books to read fiction TXT] 📗
- Author: J. S. Fletcher
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street below. For a few minutes she walked in the direction of Robson’s
offices, but when she had nearly reached them, she turned, and went
deliberately to those of Eldrick & Pascoe.
A HEADQUARTERS CONFERENCE
By the time she had been admitted to Eldrick’s private room, Nesta had
regained her composure; she had also had time to think, and her present
action was the result of at any rate a part of her thoughts. She was
calm and collected enough when she took the chair which the solicitor
drew forward.
“I called on you for two reasons, Mr. Eldrick,” she said. “First, to
thank you for your kindness and thoughtfulness at the time of my
brother’s death, in sending your clerk to help in making the
arrangements.”
“Very glad he was of any assistance, Miss Mallathorpe,” answered
Eldrick. “I thought, of course, that as he had been on the spot, as it
were, when the accident happened, he could do a few little things–-”
“He was very useful in that way,” said Nesta. “And I was very much
obliged to him. But the second reason for my call is—I want to speak to
you about him.”
“Yes?” responded Eldrick. He had already formed some idea as to what was
in his visitor’s mind, and he was secretly glad of the opportunity of
talking to her. “About Pratt, eh? What about him, Miss Mallathorpe?”
“He was with you for some years, I believe?” she asked.
“A good many years,” answered Eldrick. “He came to us as office-boy, and
was head-clerk when he left us.”
“Then you ought to know him—well,” she suggested.
“As to that,” replied Eldrick, “there are some people in this world whom
other people never could know well—that’s to say, really well. I know
Pratt well enough for what he was—our clerk. Privately, I know little
about him. He’s clever—he’s ability—he’s a chap who reads a good
deal—he’s got ambitions. And I should say he is a bit—subtle.”
“Deceitful?” she asked.
“I couldn’t say that,” replied Eldrick. “It wouldn’t be true if I said
so. I think he’s possibilities of strategy in him. But so far as we’re
concerned, we found him hardworking, energetic, truthful, dependable and
honest, and absolutely to be trusted in money matters. He’s had many and
many a thousand pounds of ours through his hands.”
“I believe you’re unaware that my mother, for some reason or other,
unknown to me, has put him in charge of her affairs?” asked Nesta.
“Yes—Mr. Collingwood told me so,” answered Eldrick. “So, too, did your
own solicitor, Mr. Robson—who’s very angry about it.”
“And you?” she said, putting a direct question. “What do you think? Do
please, tell me!”
“It’s difficult to say, Miss Mallathorpe,” replied Eldrick, with a smile
and a shake of the head. “If your mother—who, of course, is quite
competent to decide for herself—wishes to have somebody to look after
her affairs, I don’t see what objection can be taken to her procedure.
And if she chooses to put Linford Pratt in that position—why not? As I
tell you, I, as his last—and only—employer, am quite convinced of his
abilities and probity. I suppose that as your mother’s agent, he’ll
supervise her property, collect money due to her, advise her in
investments, and so on. Well, I should say—personally, mind—he’s quite
competent to do all that, and that he’ll do it honestly, I should
certainly say so.”
“But—why should he do it at all?” asked Nesta.
Eldrick waved his hands.
“Ah!” he exclaimed. “Now you ask me a very different question! But—I
understand—in fact, I know—that Pratt turns out to be a relation of
yours—distant, but it’s there. Perhaps your mother—who, of course, is
much better off since your brother’s sad death—is desirous of
benefiting Pratt—as a relation.”
“Do you advise anything?” asked Nesta.
“Well, you know, Miss Mallathorpe,” replied Eldrick, smiling. “I’m not
your legal adviser. What about Mr. Robson?”
“Mr. Robson is so very angry about all this—with my mother,” said
Nesta, “that I don’t even want to ask his advice. What I really do want
is the advice, counsel, of somebody—perhaps more as a friend than as a
solicitor.”
“Delighted to give you any help I can—either professionally or as a
friend,” exclaimed Eldrick. “But—let me suggest something. And first of
all—is there anything—something—in all this that you haven’t told to
anybody yet?”
“Yes—much!” she answered. “A great deal!”
“Then,” said Eldrick, “let me advise a certain counsel. Two heads are
better than one. Let me ask Mr. Collingwood to come here.”
He was watching his visitor narrowly as he said this, and he saw a faint
rise of colour in her cheeks. But for the moment she did not answer, and
Eldrick saw that she was thinking.
“I can get him across from his chambers in a few minutes,” he said.
“He’s sure to be in just now.”
“Can I have a few minutes to decide?” asked Nesta.
Eldrick jumped up.
“Of course!” he said. “I’ll leave you a while. It so happens I want to
see my partner, I’ll go up to his room, and return to you presently.”
Nesta, left alone, gave herself up to deep thought, and to a careful
reckoning of her position. She was longing to confide in some
trustworthy person or persons, for Pratt’s revelations had plunged her
into a maze of perplexity. But her difficulties were many. First of all,
she would have to tell all about the terrible charge brought by Pratt
against her mother. Then about the second which he professed to—or
probably did—hold. What sort of a secret could it be? And supposing her
advisers suggested strong measures against Pratt—what then, about the
danger to her mother, in a twofold direction?
Would it be better, wiser, if she kept all this to herself at present,
and waited for events to develop? But at the mere thought of that, she
shrank, feeling mentally and physically afraid—to keep all that
knowledge to herself, to brood over it in secret, to wonder what it all
meant, what lay beneath, what might develop, that was more than she felt
able to bear. And when Eldrick came back she looked at him and nodded.
“I should like to talk to you and Mr. Collingwood,” she said quietly.
Collingwood came across to Eldrick’s office at once. And to these two
Nesta unbosomed herself of every detail that she could remember of her
interview with Pratt—and as she went on, from one thing to another, she
saw the men’s faces grow graver and graver, and realized that this was a
more anxious matter than she had thought.
“That’s all,” she said in the end. “I don’t think I’ve forgotten
anything. And even now, I don’t know if I’ve done right to tell you all
this. But—I don’t think I could have faced it—alone!”
“My dear Miss Mallathorpe!” said Eldrick earnestly. “You’ve done the
wisest thing you probably ever did in your life! Now,” he went on,
looking at Collingwood, “just let us all three realize what is to me a
more important fact. Nobody would be more astonished than Pratt to know
that you have taken the wise step you have. You agree, Collingwood?”
“Yes!” answered Collingwood, after a moment’s reflection. “I think so.”
“Miss Mallathorpe doesn’t quite see what we mean,” said Eldrick, turning
to Nesta. “We mean that Pratt firmly believed, when he told you what he
did, that for your mother’s sake and your own, you would keep his
communication a dead secret. He firmly believed that you would never
dare to tell anybody what he told you. Most people—in your
position—wouldn’t have told. They’d have let the secret eat their lives
out. You’re a wise and a sensible young woman! And the thing is—we
must let Pratt remain under the impression that you are keeping your
knowledge to yourself. Let him continue to believe that you’ll remain
silent under fear. And let us meet his secret policy with a secret
strategy of our own!”
Again he glanced at Collingwood, and again Collingwood nodded assent.
“Now,” continued Eldrick, “just let us consider matters for a few
minutes from the position which has newly arisen. To begin with. Pratt’s
account of your mother’s dealings about the footbridge is a very clever
and plausible one. I can see quite well that it has caused you great
pain; so before I go any further, just let me say this to you—don’t you
attach one word of importance to it!”
Nesta uttered a heartfelt cry of relief.
“Oh!” she exclaimed. “If you knew how thankful I should be to know that
it’s all lies—that he was lying! Can I really think that—after what I
saw?”
“I won’t ask you to think that he’s telling lies—just now,” answered
Eldrick, with a glance at Collingwood, “but I’ll ask you to believe that
your mother could put a totally different aspect and complexion on all
her actions and words in connection with the entire affair. My
impression, of course,” he went on, with something very like a wink at
Collingwood, “is that Mrs. Mallathorpe, when she wrote that letter to
Pratt, intended to have the bridge mended first thing next morning, and
that something prevented that being done, and that when she was seen
about the shrubberies in the afternoon, she was on her way to meet Pratt
before he could reach the dangerous point, so that she could warn him.
What do you say, Collingwood?”
“I should say,” answered Collingwood, regarding the solicitor earnestly,
and speaking with great gravity of manner, “that that would make an
admirable line of defence to any charge which Pratt was wicked enough to
prefer.”
“You don’t think my mother meant—meant to–-” exclaimed Nesta, eagerly
turning from one man to the other. “You—don’t?”
“There is no evidence worth twopence against your mother!” replied
Eldrick soothingly. “Put everything that Pratt has said against her
clear out of your mind. Put all recent events out of your mind! Don’t
interfere with Pratt—just now. The thing to be done about Pratt is
this—and it’s the only thing. We must find out—exactly, as secretly as
possible—what this secret is of which he speaks. What is this hold on
Mrs. Mallathorpe? What is this document to which he refers? In other
words, we must work back to some point which at present we can’t see. At
least, I can’t see it. But—we may discover it. What do you say,
Collingwood?”
“I agree entirely,” answered Collingwood. “Let Pratt rest in his fancied
security. The thing is, certainly, to go back. But—to what point?”
“That we must consider later,” said Eldrick. “Now—for the present, Miss
Mallathorpe,—you are, I suppose, going back home?”
“Yes, at once,” answered Nesta. “I have my car at the Crown Hotel.”
“I should just like to know something,” continued Eldrick again, looking
at Collingwood as if for approval. “That is—Mrs. Mallathorpe’s present
disposition towards affairs in general and Pratt in particular. Miss
Mallathorpe!—just do something which I will now suggest to you. When
you reach home, see your mother—she is still, I understand, an invalid,
though evidently able to transact business. Just approach her gently and
kindly, and tell her that you are a little—should we say
uncomfortable?—about certain business arrangements which you hear she
has made with Mr. Pratt, and ask her, if she won’t talk them over with
you, and give you her full confidence. It’s now half-past twelve,”
continued Eldrick, looking at his watch. “You’ll be home before lunch.
See your mother early in the afternoon, and then telephone, briefly, the
result to me, here, at four o’clock. Then—Mr.
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