The Malefactor. E. Phillips Oppenheim

what about your own work!”

      “What will the Daily Scribbler people say?”

      Aynesworth shrugged his shoulders.

      “I don’t imagine it will last very long,” he answered, “and I shall get a fair amount of time to myself. The work I do on the Daily Scribbler doesn’t amount to anything. It was a chance I simply couldn’t refuse.”

      The editor of a well-known London paper leaned back in his chair, and pinched a cigar carefully.

      “You’ll probably find the whole thing a sell,” he remarked. “The story, as Lovell told it, sounded dramatic enough, and if the man were to come back to life again, fresh and vigorous, things might happen, provided, of course, that Lovell was right in his suppositions. But ten or twelve years’ solitary confinement, although it mayn’t sound much on paper, is enough to crush all the life and energy out of a man.”

      Aynesworth shook his head.

      “You haven’t seen him,” he said. “I have!”

      “What’s he like, Walter?” another man asked.

      “I can’t describe him,” Aynesworth answered. “I shouldn’t like to try. I’ll bring him here some day. You fellows shall see him for yourselves. I find him interesting enough.”

      “The whole thing,” the editor declared, “will fizzle out. You see if it doesn’t? A man who’s just spent ten or twelve years in prison isn’t likely to run any risk of going there again. There will be no tragedy; more likely reconciliation.”

      “Perhaps,” Aynesworth said imperturbably. “But it wasn’t only the possibility of anything of that sort happening, you know, which attracted me. It was the tragedy of the man himself, with his numbed, helpless life, set down here in the midst of us, with a great, blank chasm between him and his past. What is there left to drive the wheels? The events of one day are simple and monotonous enough to us, because they lean up against the events of yesterday, and the yesterdays before! How do they seem, I wonder, to a man whose yesterday was more than a decade of years ago!”

      The editor nodded.

      “It must be a grim sensation,” he admitted, “but I am afraid with you, my dear Walter, it is an affair of shop. You wish to cull from your interesting employer the material for that every-becoming novel of yours. Let’s go upstairs! I’ve time for one pool.”

      “I haven’t,” Aynesworth answered. “I’ve a commission to do.”

      He left the club and walked westwards, humming softly to himself, but thinking all the time intently. His errand disturbed him. He was to be the means of bringing together again these two people who had played the principal parts in Lovell’s drama—his new employer and the woman who had ruined his life. What was the object of it? What manner of vengeance did he mean to deal out to her? Lovell’s words of premonition returned to him just then with curious insistence—he was so certain that Wingrave’s reappearance would lead to tragical happenings. Aynesworth himself never doubted it. His brief interview with the man into whose service he had almost forced himself had impressed him wonderfully. Yet, what weapon was there, save the crude one of physical force, with which Wingrave could strike?

      He rang the bell at No. 13, Cadogan Street, and sent in his card by the footman. The man accepted it doubtfully.

      “Her ladyship has only just got up from luncheon, sir, and she is not receiving this afternoon,” he announced.

      Aynesworth took back his card, and scribbled upon it the name of the newspaper for which he still occasionally worked.

      “Her ladyship will perhaps see me,” he said, handing the card back to the man. “It is a matter of business. I will not detain her for more than a few minutes.”

      The man returned presently, and ushered him into a small sitting room.

      “Her ladyship will be quite half an hour before she can see you, sir,” he said.

      “I will wait,” Aynesworth answered, taking up a paper.

      The time passed slowly. At last, the door was opened. A woman, in a plain but exquisitely fitting black gown, entered. From Lovell’s description, Aynesworth recognized her at once, and yet, for a moment, he hesitated to believe that this was the woman whom he had come to see. The years had indeed left her untouched. Her figure was slight, almost girlish; her complexion as smooth, and her coloring, faint though it was, as delicate and natural as a child’s. Her eyes were unusually large, and the lashes which shielded them heavy. It was when she looked at him that Aynesworth began to understand.

      She carried his card in her hand, and glanced at it as he bowed.

      “You are the Daily Scribbler,” she said. “You want me to tell you about my bazaar, I suppose.”

      “I am attached to the Daily Scribbler, Lady Ruth Barrington,” Aynesworth answered; “but my business this afternoon has nothing to do with the paper. I have called with a message from—an old friend of yours.”

      She raised her eyebrows ever so slightly. The graciousness of her manner was perceptibly abated.

      “Indeed! I scarcely understand you, Mr.—Aynesworth.”

      “My message,” Aynesworth said, “is from Sir Wingrave Seton.”

      The look of enquiry, half impatient, half interrogative, faded slowly from her face. She stood quite still; her impassive features seemed like a plaster cast, from which all life and feeling were drawn out. Her eyes began slowly to dilate, and she shivered as though with cold. Then the man who was watching her and wondering, knew that this was fear—fear undiluted and naked.

      He stepped forward, and placed a chair for her. She felt for the back of it with trembling fingers and sat down.

      “Is—Sir Wingrave Seton—out of prison?” she asked in a strange, dry tone. One would have thought that she had been choking.

      “Since yesterday,” Aynesworth answered.

      “But his time—is not up yet?”

      “There is always a reduction,” Aynesworth reminded her, “for what is called good conduct.”

      She was silent for several moments. Then she raised her head. She was a brave woman, and she was rapidly recovering her self-possession.

      “Well,” she asked, “what does he want?”

      “To see you,” Aynesworth answered, “tomorrow afternoon, either here or at his apartments in the Clarence Hotel. He would prefer not to come here!”

      “Are you his friend?” she asked.

      “I am his secretary,” Aynesworth answered.

      “You are in his confidence?”

      “I only entered his service this morning,” he said.

      “How much do you know,” she persisted, “of the unfortunate affair which led—to his imprisonment?”

      “I have been told the whole story,” Aynesworth answered.

      Her eyes rested thoughtfully upon his. It seemed as though she were trying to read in his face exactly what he meant by “the whole story.”

      “Then,” she said, “do you think that anything but pain and unpleasantness can come of a meeting between us?”

      “Lady Ruth,” Aynesworth answered, “it is not for me to form an opinion. I am Sir Wingrave Seton’s secretary.”

      “What is he going to do?” she asked.

      “I have no idea,” he answered.

      “Is he going abroad?”

      “I know nothing of his plans,” Aynesworth declared. “What answer