XXVI.

So they left, and in a few minutes more our hero was in his automobile and speeding rapidly up town. He entered his club-house, and went to a private room, into which shortly after there came hobbling an aged, red-nosed, and gouty old aristocrat, swearing furiously and demanding, "What in the devil did you want me here for, anyhow?"

It was Mr. Chauncey van Rensselaer.

"Well," said the son, after dutifully helping him to a chair, "what do you think of it?"

"That's not answering my question," growled the other. "But Lord, Robbie, I've had a day of it! Do you know I hold five thousand of T. & S.? And I've just been crazy all day, waiting--waiting--"

Humph!" said Robert, with a smile. "Waiting for what?"

"Why, haven't you got any?" cried the other. "Don't you know who's in that syndicate?"

"Yes," said Robbie; "it's the T. & S. gang, and Smith and Shark, I supposed."

"Yes," said the other, "just so; and they mean business, too, I can tell you. You'll see this stock up in the 200's to-morrow. Who do you suppose are those fools that are fighting them?"

"I don't suppose," said Robbie, "I know."

"And who are they?"

"There aren't any 'they.'"

"How do you mean?"

"I mean there's only one man."

"What! And who is it?"

"It's Robert van Rensselaer."

And the old gentleman leapt from his chair, in spite of his gout. "Good G.o.d, Robbie!" he cried. "You're mad!"

"No," said Robbie; "it's a fact."

"But you're ruined!"

"Oh, no, not quite, Governor. (Robbie always had called him Governor.) I've spent every cent I own, but not quite ruined; for I'm going to be the richest man in New York City to-morrow at about two minutes past eleven o'clock in the morning. I'm going to have every cent that the T. & S. people and Smith and Shark can beg or borrow, and the bank accounts of several hundred lambs besides, including my aged and beloved daddy!"

The aged and beloved daddy was gasping for breath. "You're lost, Robbie!" he cried. "It can't be! How can you do it without money?"

"I've just arranged a syndicate," laughed Robbie.

"But without money?"

"They don't know I've no money," said he, cheerfully. "But I'm going to get some more, just for safety, from you."

"Humph!" said Mr. Chauncey van Rensselaer, laconically.

"In the first place," said the other man, "you're going to sell those shares to-morrow morning at ten o'clock; and in the second you're going to sell short on T. & S. all you find takers for; and about eleven o'clock you're going to see the sky fall down and hit the earth."

"What's going to cause it?"

"For one thing, your being there selling short. You old Wall Street rounders are like vultures about a carca.s.s--people will only have to see you hobbling down town, and they'll know there's a smash-up coming; and if you whisper you're selling T. & S. it'll come right then."

"There's something in that," admitted the old gentleman, after some hesitation.

"But that's not the thing I want to see you about," laughed Robbie. "The main thing is still to come. It is that you're going to make me a present right away of a couple of million dollars."

Mr. Chauncey van Rensselaer bounced slightly in his chair, and his eyes were very wide open.

"Two millions, at least," reiterated Robbie, seeing that he was speechless. "And give it, not lend it. If I asked you to lend it, then I'd have to go into all kinds of explanations, and I couldn't ever make you see the thing as plainly as I do. All I say is that I've been a good boy and supported myself for thirteen years without ever striking my old daddy for a cent; and that now I want it and want it bad. You're going to die some day, and then you'll leave it all to me. And by that time it'll be of no use in the world to me; for if this stroke fails, it'll be too little, and if it succeeds, it won't be anything at all. And so I want you to give it to me now."

Mr. Chauncey van Rensselaer took a long, long breath; then he sat forward and drew up to the table. "Robbie," he said, "tell me about this business. Tell me all."

"First I want the two millions."

"Confound you," observed the other. "Don't you know if you want 'em, you'll get 'em? But go on now, and tell me about the thing, and don't be a fool."

And so Robbie told him; and before the end of it the elder gentleman was rubbing his hands. Afterwards he hobbled out of the room and mailed a note to his brokers, ordering them to sell his T. & S. holdings at the opening price; also he wrote instructing his bankers that Mr. Robert van Rensselaer was to draw on his credit for three million dollars.

And in the meantime Mr. Robert van Rensselaer was still pacing up and down the room, his hands behind his back, and a very pleasant look upon his mellow countenance. He was at that moment, beyond question, the happiest and the contentedest man in New York: when all of a sudden there was a knock on the door, and an attendant entered.

"A note for you, sir," he said. "It's marked 'Urgent.'"

And our friend took it; he waited until the man had gone, and then he opened it, and read this:-- "MR. ROBERT VAN RENSSELAER: "Dear Sir,--Will you kindly request our friend Mr. Green to call this evening upon a matter of the utmost possible urgency to him at the house of his old friend Mrs. Lynch?"

XXVII.

It would not profit to produce the remarks of Robert van Rensselaer upon reading the note. Possibly the reader had imagined that he was through with Mrs. Lynch; certainly, at any rate, Mr. Van Rensselaer had imagined it. But one of the disadvantages about some of the pleasant things of life is this fact that, when we wish to forget them, they are not always willing to forget us.

Who had written the letter and what was the purpose of it was a problem which our hero pondered for many hours,--hours which he spent either in pacing up and down the room, or in sitting motionless in a chair, with hands clenched and eyes fixed upon vacancy.

When finally he came to a decision, it was evidently a desperate one, for his brow was black and his eyes shone. He strode out of the room, and a moment or so later was whirling up town in a cab. Before long he got out and walked, and when the cab had disappeared, he called another, and entering that drove to the residence of Mary Harrison.

She was clad in a pink silk gown, and her cheeks were bright with happiness; she was so altogether wonderful that Robert van Rensselaer's frown half melted, in spite of himself, as he walked into the room. The frown did not go so fast, however, that she failed to note it.

"What's the matter?" she cried.

And his frown came back again. "Mary," he said abruptly, "we've got to part."

The girl gave a start. "What do you mean?" she cried.

"I mean just what I say," he answered. "We've got to part." And then seeing the ghastly pallor that came over her, he drew her to him and went and sat down on the sofa. "Listen to me, Mary," he said more gently; "you're a good girl, and I have no fear to tell you the whole truth. I know that you have nothing to do with it; but I've gotten into serious trouble, and there is only one way in the world to save myself."

"What do you mean, Jim?" she panted. (Jim was the name she had been taught to call him.) "Mary," said he, "you know that I'm a married man, don't you?"

"Yes," she said, "but what--"

"And that I'm a very rich man? Well, Mrs. Lynch has set to work to blackmail me."

The girl shrunk back. "You--what!" she panted.

"It's true," said he; "I've had to pay her several thousand dollars already."

"Good heavens!" cried the girl. "It can't be so!"

"It is," replied he. "And it means only one thing,--that we've got to part forever."

XXVIII.

Mary Harrison was reeling like a drunken person; she clutched at a chair. "Jim," she gasped, "what's to become of me?"

"You know that I'll always see that you are taken care of," he began.

"I don't--I don't mean that," she cried. "But, oh--I love you--I can't do without you! Where in Heaven's name am I to go?" and she flung herself upon him with a pa.s.sionate cry. "What am I to do?" she cried, again and again. "How can I bear it?"

He strove to calm her. "Listen," he whispered, "don't take it so hard. Perhaps you may forget me--please don't act like that."

She was shuddering convulsively. "No, no!" she cried. "It would kill me--it would!" And then suddenly she leapt to her feet, her eyes blazing. "I'll kill that woman!" she panted. "That's what I'll do!"

The man drew her to him again, striving to calm her. "No, no, Mary," he said. "That will only make it worse for me. If you love me, you must give me up. That is the only way."

She sat there, white and trembling, moaning to herself. She smoothed the beautiful hair back from her forehead, and sat staring in front of her with a dazed expression.

"Give you up!" she whispered hoa.r.s.ely. "Give you up!"

Her companion felt extremely uncomfortable; naturally, a good-hearted man does not like to make a woman suffer, especially a woman whom he still loves. He had made up his mind, however, and he meant to carry it through. He let her lean on his bosom and sob away her grief.

"And can't I ever see you--even just a little bit?" she moaned.

"No," he said firmly. "Can you not see, Mary, that there is no place in the world where I could keep you that that woman could not track me to? She has found me out and tracked me here already and she could ruin me, Mary, drive me to kill myself."

The other shuddered. "No," she said, "you must not do that. You are right, and I must make the sacrifice. I will go--I can bear it, I guess. But oh, Jim, I never really loved any one but you, and I never shall."

"I shall never forget you," said he. "And I will give you all you need, Mary,--you won't have to worry about money." But the girl scarcely heard him; she was not thinking about money.

"And where will you go?" he asked finally.

"I don't know," said she. "I have no home. Where should I go? I suppose I'll go back where I came from--back to Albany."

Robert van Rensselaer looked at her; the name Albany brought back a sudden memory to him. "Well, I declare," he said, "you did not tell me you came from Albany." He hesitated a moment and then went on, "Perhaps, maybe, you know a girl there--But I don't know her name," he added, with a slight laugh.

"Then I'm afraid I couldn't tell you," said the other, answering his smile. "But I knew very few people there. I never knew any one at all until after my mother went away some years ago."

"Went away?" asked the other. "I thought you said she died."

"She must have died, for she was very ill," said the girl. "But I don't know what became of her--she never came back."

The man was gazing at her in surprise. "Never came back?" he echoed; and then he added, "What was your mother's name?"

"Helen," said she; and he sunk back.

"Ah, it was an awful thing," went on the girl, her voice trembling. "Poor, dear mother, how hard she worked to take care of me--and how good she was! She worked herself to death, Jim, that's the truth."

"What was the matter with her?"

"She had consumption," said the girl, and she saw him start. "What's the matter?" she asked.

"Nothing," said he, "that is--it's just a queer coincidence; but what was your father's name?"

"I never knew anything about my father," said the girl. "Mother never told me; but I always suspected that he had not married her--that is--"

She stopped again, for his manner was strange; then, however, she went on. "I think he was rich," she said, "and very handsome and good. She gave me a locket with his picture that she said only he would have the key to open; she had lost the one he gave her."

And again she stopped; a ghastly, ashen pallor had come over the face of Robert van Rensselaer; he leaned close to her, his eyes, his whole face, looming large with horror. His hand shook like an autumn leaf as he stretched it out to her. "A locket! a locket!" he gasped. "My G.o.d! Have you got it?"

"Yes," cried the girl, in astonishment, and she went to the bureau. She held it to him as he ran toward her, and he took one glance at it and staggered back like a man struck to the heart with a knife. He gave one wild, horrible cry, and clutched his hands to his head, and reeled, and would have fallen.

But Mary had sprung to him in terror. "Jim! Jim!" she cried, "what is it?" She would have caught him, but he shrunk from her touch as from a wild beast. "No! no!" he screamed, and crouched in the corner with eyes of dreadful fear. "No! go back!"

"But, Jim," cried the girl, "what is it? What is the matter?"

The man had sunk down on his knees, shaking convulsively. "O my G.o.d!" he was gasping, "O my G.o.d!"

Mary sprang to him again, and flung her arms about him. "Jim! Jim!" she cried hysterically, "you must tell me what it is--you must--you must! Do you know who my father was?"

"Yes," he gasped, writhing, "I know--I know!"