"Stage seven! What do you mean?"

"Why don't--you know!" Curtis gurgled--and then a sudden gleam of intelligence coming into his watery eyes, he added. "Then I shan't tell you--nothing shall make me. It's a shecret!"

"I won't kiss you till you do!" Lilian Rosenberg said.

"I'll make you."

"Oh, no, you won't," Lilian Rosenberg cried, disengaging herself from his grasp, and rising. "Don't you dare touch me. I'm going."

Curtis watched her with a helpless grin. Then he suddenly cried out, "Come back! Come back, I shay!"

"Well, will you do as I want?" Lilian Rosenberg said.

"I'll do anything--anything to please you--if only you shtay with me."

She sat down, and his arm once again encircled her.

"Now," she said, pushing his face away. "Tell me!"

Bit by bit she drew out of him the whole history of the compact with the Unknown, how in stage five, the stage they were about to enter, they would have fresh powers conferred upon them--their present power, _i.e._ of working spells and causing diseases, being then cancelled; how they would obtain supreme power over women when they reached the final stage--stage seven; and how the compact would be broken and their ruin brought about, should either of them marry, or should anything happen before this final stage was reached, to disunite them.

Lilian could account for a great deal now. The uncanny feeling she had always experienced in the building; the curious enigmatical shadows she had seen hovering about the doorways and flitting down the pa.s.sages; the extraordinary nature of the feats and spells; Hamar's mutterings and his fury, whenever Kelson spoke to her--were no longer wholly unintelligible. But she must know all. She must be most exacting.

Finally, she got from Curtis everything there was to be got from him, and she laughed immoderately, when he excused himself on the grounds that it was all Leon's doings--Leon had told him to offer her a little compensation for the loss of her escort.

"And you have compensated me more than enough," Lilian Rosenberg said.

"Now you shall have your reward," and she kissed him--kissed him three times for luck.

"But you're not going?" he said, staggering to his feet and attempting to hold her. "You're not going till the roshy morning sun shines shaucily in on us."

"Oh, yes, I am," she said. "I've had quite enough of you! Good-bye!"

And before he could prevent her, she had run to the front door and let herself out.

CHAPTER XXVI

IN HYDE PARK AT NIGHT

But now that Lilian Rosenberg was possessed of all this information respecting the trio, she was once again in doubt how to act, or whether to act at all. Supposing she were to attempt to warn Gladys Martin against Hamar, how would Gladys take the warning? Would she pay any attention to it? The odds were she would not; that having set her heart on marrying Hamar for his money, she would blind herself to his faults and resolutely shut her ears to anything said against him. Also there was the very great possibility of Gladys being rude to her--and even the thought of this was more than she could bear to contemplate.

If only Shiel were reasonable! If only he could be made to see how utterly ridiculous it was for him to think of winning such a girl as Gladys--Gladys the pretty, dolly-faced, pampered actress, who had never known a single hardship, had always had a well-lined purse, and would never, never marry poverty! Then back to Lilian Rosenberg's mind came her parting with Shiel--she recalled his intense scorn and indignation. A liar! He did not wish to have anything to do with a liar! It's a good thing every man is not so fastidious, she said to herself bitterly, or the population of the world would soon fizz out.

She laughed. He had never questioned her morals in any other sense--perhaps, in his innocence or a.s.sumed innocence, he had thought them spotless--at all events he had most graciously ignored them. But a liar! A liar--he could not put up with. And why! Because the lie had touched him on a sore point. When lies do not touch a sore point, they, too, are ignored.

She walked to the Imperial and looked again at Gladys's photographs.

How any man could fall madly in love with such a face, was more than she could conceive. It was a mincing, maudlin, finicking face--it irritated her intensely. She turned away from it in disgust, yet came back to have another look--and yet another. G.o.d knows why! It fascinated her. Finally she left it, fully resolved to let its odious original go to her fate--without a warning. Soon after her return to the Hall in c.o.c.kspur Street, she was sent for by Hamar.

"Didn't I tell you," he said, "that you were on no account to encourage Mr. Kelson?"

"You did!" Lilian Rosenberg replied.

"Will you kindly explain, then," Hamar said, "why you have disobeyed my orders?"

"How have I disobeyed them?" Lilian Rosenberg asked.

"How!" Hamar retorted, his cheeks white with pa.s.sion. "You dare to inquire how! Why, you were on the point of accompanying him to his rooms last night to supper, when I stopped you! I have overlooked your disobedience so many times that I can do so no longer. Your services will not be required by the Firm after to-day fortnight."

"Won't they?" Lilian Rosenberg replied, her anger rising. "I think you are mistaken. I know a great deal too much to make it safe for you to part with me. I know--for instance--all about your Compact with the Unknown!"

"You know nothing," Hamar said, his voice faltering.

"Oh, yes, I do!" Lilian Rosenberg answered. "I know everything. I know how you first got in communication with the Unknown in San Francisco; I know how you receive fresh powers from the Unknown every three months (the old powers being cancelled). I know the penalty you will undergo should the Compact be broken--and--what is more--I know how the Compact can be broken."

"How the deuce have you learned all this?" Hamar stammered.

"Never you mind. Am I to remain in your service or leave?"

"I think," Hamar said, stroking his chin thoughtfully, "it is better that you should remain--better for all parties. I owe you some little recompense for your loyalty to the Firm, and for the admirable way you spoke up for the Firm in Court. I will make you out a cheque for a hundred pounds now--and your salary shall be doubled at the end of this week. Promise to keep out of Mr. Kelson's way in future--for the next six months at any rate--after that time you may see him as often as you like--and I will give you as a wedding present a cheque for twenty thousand pounds!"

"Twenty thousand pounds! You are joking!"

"I'm not. I vow and declare I mean it. Is that a bargain?"

"I will certainly think it well over," Lilian Rosenberg said, "and let you know my decision later on."

From what Curtis had told her she knew it was the last day of stage four, that the trio that evening would be initiated into stage five--the Stage of Cures, and a mad desire seized her to witness the initiation. But how would the Unknown manifest itself on this occasion--and to which of the trio? She could not keep a close watch on the three of them. If only she had been friends with Shiel, they might, in some way, have worked it together. Curtis had carefully avoided her since the supper; but she had seen Kelson, and he had looked at her each time he met her as if he yearned to fall down at her feet and worship her. Should she attach herself to him for the evening--and run the risk of another quarrel with Hamar? She dearly loved risks and dangers--and the danger she would encounter in defying Hamar appealed to her sporting nature. It was easy to secure Kelson--one glance from her eyes--and he would have followed her to Timbuctoo.

"Charing Cross--under clock--after show to-night," she whispered as she flew hurriedly past him. "I want to speak to you."

Now it so happened that Hamar had given Kelson orders to return to his rooms, directly the performance was over, and to remain in them till morning, in case he was wanted in connection with the initiation. But he might have spared himself the trouble. It was Lilian, and Lilian only, that Kelson now thought of--it was Lilian, and Lilian only, that he would obey. The idea of meeting her--of having her all to himself--of being able to do her a service--filled him with such uncontrollable delight, that he hardly knew how to comport himself so as not to arouse Hamar's suspicions. Directly the performance was over he sneaked out of the Hall, and pretending not to hear Hamar, who called after him, he jumped into a taxi, and was whirled away to the trysting-place. Lilian Rosenberg, who arrived a moment later, was dressed in a new costume, and Kelson thought her looking smarter and daintier than ever.

"You shall kiss me at once," she said, "if you promise me one thing."

"And what is that?" he asked, looking hungrily at her lips.

"I want you to let me see the Unknown when it comes to you to-night,"

she said.

"Good G.o.d! What do you know about the Unknown!" he exclaimed, his jaws falling, and a look of terror creeping into his eyes.

"A great deal," she laughed, "so much that I want to learn more"--and of what she knew she told him, just as much as she had told Hamar.

"And now," she said, "I repeat my promise--you shall have a kiss--think of that--if only you will hide me somewhere so that I can see the Unknown or its emissary."

"I would do anything for a kiss," Kelson said, "but I fear it is impossible to fulfil the condition, because I haven't the remotest idea where or when the Unknown will appear. Besides, it is just as likely to go to Hamar or Curtis as to come to me; and up to the present I haven't felt the remotest suggestion of its favouring me. Is this the only condition I can fulfil, so that you will let me kiss you?"

"Certainly," Lilian Rosenberg replied. "I am not in the habit of being kissed. Such an event can only happen in the most exceptional and privileged circ.u.mstances--such, for example, as exist at the present moment, when I ask you to put yourself to some considerable trouble--if not actually to incur danger--in order to accomplish what I wish."