The Lone Wolf, Louis Joseph Vance [best historical fiction books of all time txt] 📗

>last we met!”

 

His spirit was irresistible: in spite of himself Lanyard returned the

smile. “I never knew a man to take it with better grace,” he admitted,

lighting his own cigarette.

 

“Why not! I liked it: you gave us precisely what we asked for.”

 

“Then,” Lanyard demanded gravely, “if that’s your viewpoint, if you’re

decent enough to see it that way—what the devil are you doing in that

galley?”

 

“Mischief makes strange bed-fellows, you’ll admit. And if you think

that a fair question—what are you doing here, with me?”

 

“Same excuse as before—trying to find out what your game is.”

 

Wertheimer eyed the ceiling with an intimate grin. “My dear fellow!” he

protested—“all you want to know is everything!”

 

“More or less,” Lanyard admitted gracelessly. “One gathers that you

mean to stop this side the Channel for some time.”

 

“How so?”

 

“There’s a settled, personal atmosphere about this establishment. It

doesn’t look as if half your things were still in trunks.”

 

“Oh, these digs! Yes, they are comfy.”

 

“You don’t miss London?”

 

“Rather! But I shall appreciate it all the more when I go back.”

 

“Then you can go back, if you like?”

 

“Meaning your impression is, I made it too hot for me?”

 

Wertheimer interposed with a quizzical glance. “I shan’t tell you

about that. But I’m hoping to be able to run home for an occasional

week-end without vexing Scotland Yard. Why not come with me some

time?”

 

Lanyard shook his head.

 

“Come!” the Englishman rallied him. “Don’t put on so much side. I’m not

bad company. Why not be sociable, since we’re bound to be thrown

together more or less in the way of business.”

 

“Oh, I think not.”

 

“But, my dear chap, you can’t keep this up. Playing taxi-way man is

hardly your shop. And of course you understand you won’t be permitted

to engage in any more profitable pursuit until you make terms with the

powers that be—or leave Paris.”

 

“Terms with Bannon, De Morbihan, Popinot and yourself—eh?”

 

“With the same.”

 

“Mr. Wertheimer,” Lanyard told him quietly, “none of you will stop me

if ever I make up my mind to take the field again.”

 

“You haven’t been thinking of quitting it—what?” Wertheimer demanded

innocently, opening his eyes wide.

 

“Perhaps…”

 

“Ah, now I begin to see a light! So that’s the reason you’ve come down

to tooling a taxi. I wondered! But somehow, Mr. Lanyard”—Wertheimer’s

eyes narrowed thoughtfully—“I can hardly see you content with that

line… even if this reform notion isn’t simple swank!”

 

“Well, what do you think?”

 

“I think,” the Englishman laughed—”I think this conference doesn’t

get anywhere in particular. Our simple, trusting natures don’t seem to

fraternize as spontaneously as they might. We may as well cut the

sparring and go, down to business—don’t you think? But before we do,

I’d like your leave to offer one word of friendly advice.”

 

“And that is—?”

 

“‘Ware Bannon!”

 

Lanyard nodded. “Thanks,” he said simply.

 

“I say that in all sincerity,” Wertheimer declared. “God knows you’re

nothing to me, but at least you’ve played the game like a man; and I

won’t see you butchered to make an Apache holiday for want of warning.”

 

“Bannon’s as vindictive as that, you think?”

 

“Holds you in the most poisonous regard, if you ask me. Perhaps you

know why: I don’t. Anyway, it was rotten luck that brought your car to

the door tonight. He named you during dinner, and while apparently he

doesn’t know where to look for you, it is plain he’s got no use for

you—not, at least, until your attitude towards the organization

changes.”

 

“It hasn’t. But I’m obliged.”

 

“Sure you can’t see your way to work with us?”

 

“Absolutely.”

 

“Mind you, I’ll have to report to the Old Man. I’ve got to tell him

your answer.”

 

“I don’t think I need tell you what to tell him,” said Lanyard with

a grin.

 

“Still, it’s worth thinking over. I know the Old Man’s mind well enough

to feel safe in offering you any inducement you can name, in reason, if

you’ll come to us. Ten thousand francs in your pocket before morning,

if you like, and freedom to chuck this filthy job of yours—”

 

“Please stop there!” Lanyard interrupted hotly. “I was beginning to

like you, too… Why persist in reminding me you’re intimate with the

brute who had Roddy butchered in his sleep?”

 

“Poor devil!” Wertheimer said gently. “That was a sickening business,

I admit. But who told you—?”

 

“Never mind. It’s true, isn’t it?”

 

“Yes,” the Englishman admitted gravely—“it’s true. It lies at Bannon’s

door, when all’s said…. Perhaps you won’t believe me, but it’s a fact

I didn’t know positively who was responsible till tonight.”

 

“You don’t really expect me to swallow that? You were hand-in-glove—”

 

“Ah, but on probation only! When they voted Roddy out, I wasn’t

consulted. They kept me in the dark—mostly, I flatter myself, because

I draw the line at murder. If I had known—this you won’t believe, of

course—Roddy would be alive to-day.”

 

“I’d like to believe you,” Lanyard admitted. “But when you ask me to

sign articles with that damned assassin—!”

 

“You can’t play our game with clean hands,” Wertheimer retorted.

 

Lanyard found no answer to that.

 

“If you’ve said all you wished to,” he suggested, rising, “I can assure

you my answer is final—and go about my business.”

 

“What’s your hurry? Sit down. There’s more to say—much more.”

 

“As for instance—?”

 

“I had a fancy you might like to put a question or two.”

 

Lanyard shook his head; it was plain that Wertheimer designed to draw

him out through his interest in Lucy Shannon.

 

“I haven’t the slightest curiosity concerning your affairs,” he

observed.

 

“But you should have; I could tell you a great many interesting things

that intimately affect your affairs, if I liked. You must understand

that I shall hold the balance of power here, from now on.”

 

“Congratulations!” Lanyard laughed derisively.

 

“No joke, my dear chap: I’ve been promoted over the heads of your

friends, De Morbihan and Popinot, and shall henceforth be—as they say

in America—the whole works.”

 

“By what warrant?”

 

“The illustrious Bannon’s. I’ve been appointed his lieutenant—vice

Greggs, deposed for bungling.”

 

“Do you mean to tell me Bannon controls De Morbihan and Popinot?”

 

The Englishman smiled indulgently. “If you didn’t know it, he’s

commander-in-chief of our allied forces, presiding genius of the

International Underworld Unlimited.”

 

“Bosh!” cried Lanyard contemptuously. “Why talk to me as if I were a

child, to be frightened by a bogey-tale like that?”

 

“Take it or leave it: the fact remains…. I know, if you don’t. I

confess I didn’t till tonight; but I’ve learned some things that have

opened my eyes…. You see, we had a table in a quiet corner of the

Caf� de la Paix, and since the Old Man’s sailing for home before long

it was time for him to unbosom rather thoroughly to the man he leaves

to represent him in London and Paris. I never suspected our power

before he began to talk….”

 

Lanyard, watching the man closely, would have sworn he had never seen

one more sober. He was indescribably perplexed by this ostensible

candour—mystified and mistrustful.

 

“And then there’s this to be considered, from your side,” Wertheimer

resumed with the most business-like manner: “you can work with us

without being obliged to deal in any way with the Old Man or De

Morbihan, or Popinot. Bannon will never cross the Atlantic again, and

you can do pretty much as you like, within reason—subject to my

approval, that is.”

 

“One of us is mad,” Lanyard commented profoundly.

 

“One of us is blind to his best interests,” Wertheimer amended with

entire good-humour.

 

“Perhaps… Let it go at that. I’m not interested—never did care for

fairy tales.”

 

“Don’t go yet. There is still much to be said on both sides of the

argument.”

 

“Has there been one?”

 

“Besides, I promised you news from Antwerp.”

 

“To be sure,” Lanyard said, and paused, his curiosity at length engaged.

 

Wertheimer delved into the breast-pocket of his dress-coat and produced

a blue telegraph-form, handing it to the adventurer.

 

Of even date, from Antwerp, it read:

 

“_Underworld—Paris—Greggs arrested today boarding

steamer for America after desperate struggle killed himself

immediately afterward poison no confession—Q-2._”

 

“Underworld?” Lanyard queried blankly.

 

“Our telegraphic address, of course. ‘Q-2’ is our chief factor in

Antwerp.”

 

“So they got Greggs!”

 

“Stupid oaf,” Wertheimer observed; “I’ve no sympathy for him. The whole

affair was a blunder, from first to last.”

 

“But you got Greggs out and burned Troyon’s—!”

 

“Still our friends at the Pr�fecture weren’t satisfied. Something must

have roused their suspicions.”

 

“You don’t know what?”

 

“There must have been a leak somewhere—”

 

“If so, it would certainly have led the police to me, after all the

pains you were at to saddle me with the crime. There’s something more

than simple treachery in this, Mr. Wertheimer.”

 

“Perhaps you’re right,” said the other thoughtfully.

 

“And it doesn’t speak well for the discipline of your precious

organization—granting, for the sake of the argument, the possibility

of such nonsense.”

 

“Well, well, have your own way about that. I don’t insist, so long as

you agree to join forces with me.”

 

“Oh, it’s with you alone, now—is it? Not with that insane fiction,

the International Underworld Unlimited?”

 

“With me alone. I offer you a clear field. Go where you like, do what

you will—I wouldn’t have the cheek to attempt to guide or influence

you.”

 

Lanyard kept himself in hand with considerable difficulty.

 

“But you?” he asked. “Where do you come in?”

 

Wertheimer lounged back in his chair and laughed quietly. “Need you

ask? Must I recall to you the foundations of my prosperity? You had the

name of it glib enough on your tongue the other night in the rue

Chaptal…. When you’ve done your work, you’ll come to me and split the

proceeds fairly—and as long as you do that, never a word will pass my

lips!”

 

“Blackmail…!”

 

“Oh, if you insist! Odd, how I dislike that word!”

 

Abruptly the adventurer got to his feet. “By God!” he cried, “I’d

better get out of this before I do you an injury!”

 

The door slammed behind him on a room ringing with Wertheimer’s

unaffected laughter.

XX WAR

But why?—he asked himself as he swung his cab aimlessly away—why that

blind rage with which he had welcomed Wertheimer’s overtures?

 

Unquestionably the business of blackmailing was despicable enough; and

as a master cracksman, of the highest caste of the criminal world, the

Lone Wolf had warrantably treated with scorn and contempt the advances

of a pariah like Wertheimer. But in no such spirit had he comprehended

the Englishman’s meaning, when finally that one came to the point; no

cool disdain had coloured his attitude, but in the beginning hot

indignation, in the end insensate rage….

 

He puzzled himself. That fit of passion had all the aspect of a

psychical inconsistency impossible to reconcile with reason.

 

He recalled in perplexity how, toward the last, the face of the

Englishman had swum in haze before his eyes; with what disfavour,

approaching hatred, he had regarded its fixed, false smirk; with what

loathing he had suffered the intimacy of Wertheimer’s tone; how he had

been tempted to fly at the man’s throat and shake him senseless in

reward of his effrontery: emotions that had