"Help yourself," he remarked, as he sat down.

Sipping his brandy and soda, Hartwell opened the game.

"You see," he began, addressing Pierre, "things aren't running very smoothly out here, and I have come out to size up the situation. The fact is, I'm the only one of our company who knows a thing about mining.

It's only a side issue with me, but I can't well get out of it. My people look to me to help them out, and I've got to do it."

"Your people have ze great good fortune--ver' great." Pierre bowed smilingly.

Hartwell resumed: "I'm a fair man. I have now what I consider sufficient knowledge to warrant me in making some radical changes out here; but I want to get all the information possible, and from every possible source. Then I can act with a perfectly clear conscience." He spoke decidedly, as he refilled his gla.s.s.

"Then fire that gla.s.s-eyed supe of yours," Morrison burst out. "You never had any trouble till he came."

Hartwell looked mild reproach. Morrison was going too fast. There was a pause. Morrison again spoke, this time sullenly and without raising his eyes.

"He's queered himself with the men. They'll do him if he stays. They ain't going to stand his sneaking round and treating them like dogs.

They----"

"Mistaire Mo-reeson speak bad English, ver' bad." Pierre's words cut in like keen-edged steel. "On ze odder side ze door, it not mek so much mattaire."

Morrison left the room without a word further. There was a look of sullen satisfaction on his face. Hartwell smiled approvingly at Pierre.

"You've got your man cinched all right."

"Hall but ze tongue." Pierre shrugged his shoulders, with a slight wave of his hands.

"Well," Hartwell resumed, "I want to get at the bottom of this stage business. Fifty thousand doesn't matter so much to us; it's the thing back of it. What I want to know is whether it was an accident, or whether it was a hold-up."

"Feefty tousand dollaire!" Pierre spoke musingly. "She bin a lot of monnaie. A whole lot." Pierre hesitated, then looked up at Hartwell.

"Well?" Hartwell asked.

"How you know she bin feefty tousand dollaire hin ze safe?"

"Mr. Firmstone advised me of its shipment."

"_Bien!_ Ze safe, where she bin now?"

"In the river."

"A-a-ah! You bin see her, heh?"

"No. The water's too high."

"When ze wattaire bin mek ze G.o.down, you bin find her, heh?"

"I suppose so."

"_Bien!_ Mek ze suppose. When ze wattaire mek ze G.o.down, you not find ze safe?"

To some extent, Hartwell had antic.i.p.ated Pierre's drift, but he preferred to let him take his own course.

"It would look as if someone had got ahead of us."

Pierre waved his hand impatiently. "Feefty tousand dollaire bin whole lot monnaie. Big lot men like feefty tousand dollaire, ver' big lot.

Bimeby somebody get ze safe. Zey find no feefty tousand dollaire--only pig lead, heh?" Pierre looked up shrewdly. "Ze men no mek ze talk 'bout feefty tousand dollaire, no mek ze talk 'bout honly pig lead, heh?"

"You think, then, the bullion was never put into the safe?" Hartwell had hardly gone so far as Pierre. "In other words, that Mr. Firmstone kept out the bullion, planned the wreck, caused the report to be spread that there was fifty thousand in the safe, with the idea of either putting it out of the way himself, or that someone else would get it?"

Pierre looked up with well-feigned surprise.

"_Moi?_" he asked. "_Moi?_" He shrugged his shoulders. "I mek ze fact, ze suppose. You mek ze conclude."

Hartwell looked puzzled.

"But," he said, "if what you say is true, there is no other conclusion."

Pierre again shrugged his shoulders impatiently.

"_Bien!_ I mek no conclude. You mek ze conclude. Ze suppose mek ze conclude. She's bin no mattaire _a moi_. I mek no conclude." Pierre's words and manner both intimated that, so far as he was concerned, the interview was closed.

Pierre was a merciful man and without malice. When he felt that his dagger had made a mortal thrust he never turned it in the wound. In this interview circ.u.mstances had forced him farther than he cared to go. He was taking chances, and he knew it. Zephyr was booked to disappear.

Others than Zephyr were watching the river. But Zephyr might escape; the company might recover the money. What, then? Only his scheme would have miscarried. The recovery of the money would clear Firmstone and leave him where he was before. Pierre's diagnosis of Hartwell was to the effect that, if an idea was once lodged in his mind, an earthquake would not jar it out again. Even in this event Pierre's object would be accomplished. Firmstone would have to go.

Hartwell made several ineffectual attempts to draw out Pierre still farther, but the wily Frenchman baffled him at every turn. And there the matter rested. Had Hartwell taken less of Pierre's good brandy, he would hardly have taken so freely of his sinister suggestions. As it was, the mellow liquor began to impart a like virtue to his wits, and led him to clap the little Frenchman's back, as he declared his belief that Pierre was a slick bird, but that his own plumage was smoothly preened as well.

Followed by Pierre, he rose to leave the room. His eyes fell upon elise, sitting quietly at her desk, and he halted.

His outstretched hand had hardly touched the unsuspecting girl when Pierre caught him by the collar, and, with a twist and shove, sent him staggering half-way across the room. Little short of murder was blazing from Pierre's eyes.

"_c.r.a.paud!_" he hissed. "You put ze fingaire hon my li'l elise! _Sacre mille tonnerre!_ I kill you!" Pierre started as if to carry out his threat, but restraining hands held him back, while other hands and feet buffeted and kicked the dazed Hartwell into the street.

The safe guarding of elise was the one bright spot in Pierre's very shady career. To the fact that it was bright and strong his turning on Hartwell bore testimony. Every point in Pierre's policy had dictated conciliation and sufferance; but now this was cast aside. Pierre rapidly gained control of his temper, but he shifted his animus from the l.u.s.t of gain to the glutting of revenge.

CHAPTER XV

_Bending the Twig_

Firmstone had done a very unusual thing for him in working himself up to the point where anything that threatened delay in his proposed rescue of elise made him impatient. The necessity for immediate action had impressed itself so strongly upon him that he lost sight of the fact that others, even more deeply concerned than himself, might justly claim consideration. He knew that in some way Zephyr was more or less in touch with Pierre and Madame. Just how or why, he was in no mood to inquire.

Only a self-reliant mind is capable of distinguishing between that which is an essential part and that which seems to be. So it happened that Firmstone, when for the second time he met Zephyr at the Devil's Elbow, listened impatiently to the latter's comments on the loss of the safe.

When at last he abruptly closed that subject and with equal abruptness introduced the one uppermost in his mind the cold reticence of Zephyr surprised and shocked him.

The two men had met by chance, almost the first day that Firmstone had a.s.sumed charge of the Rainbow properties, and each had impressed the other with a feeling of profound respect. This respect had ripened into a genuine friendship. Zephyr saw in Firmstone a man who knew his business, a man capable of applying his knowledge, whose duty to his employers never blinded his eyes to the rights of his workmen, a man who saw clearly, acted decisively, and yielded to the humblest the respect which he exacted from the highest. These characteristics grew on Zephyr until they filled his entire mental horizon, and he never questioned what might be beyond. Yet now he had fear for elise. Firmstone was so far above her. Zephyr shook his head. Marriage was not to be thought of, only a hopeless love on the part of elise that would bring misery in the end. This was Zephyr's limit, and this made him coldly silent in the presence of Firmstone's advances. Firmstone was not thus limited.

Zephyr's silent reticence was quickly fathomed. His liking for the man grew. He spoke calmly and with no trace of resentment.

"Of course, elise is nothing to me in a way. But to think of a girl with her possibilities being dwarfed and ruined by her surroundings!" He paused, then added, "I wish my sister had come out with me. She wanted to come."