Part 5

“Maybe,” volunteered the doctor sadly, “she has heard there is a woman in the case. Maybe she is the one she’s thinking of sticking the knife into?”

“Well,” declared the reporter, “if she doesn’t stop looking savage every time I promise to find Harry I won’t find Harry. Why should I act the part of Fate, anyway? How do I know that Harry hasn’t got a wife in London and several in the States? How do we know he didn’t leave his country for his country’s good? That’s what it looks like to me. How can we tell what confronted him the day he went down to the hotel desk to change his rooms and, instead, got into his touring-car and beat the speed limit to Canada. Whom did he meet in the hotel corridor? A woman with a perfectly good marriage certificate, or a detective with a perfectly good warrant? Or did Harry find out that his bride had a devil of a temper of her own, and that for him marriage was a failure? The widow is certainly a very charming young woman, but there may be two sides to this.”

“You are a cynic, sir,” protested the doctor.

“That may be,” growled the reporter, “but I am not a private detective agency, or a matrimonial bureau, and before I hear myself saying, ‘Bless you, my children!’ both of these young people will have to show me why they should not be kept asunder.”

On the afternoon of their arrival in London Ford convoyed Mrs. Ashton to an old-established private hotel in Craven Street.

“Here,” he explained, “you will be within a few hundred yards of the place in which your husband is said to spend his time. I will be living in the same hotel. If I find him you will know it in ten minutes.”

The widow gave a little gasp, whether of excitement or of happiness Ford could not determine.

“Whatever happens,” she begged, “will you let me hear from you sometimes? You are the only person I know in London--and--it’s so big it frightens me. I don’t want to be a burden,” she went on eagerly, “but if I can feel you are within call--”

“What you need,” said Ford heartily, “is less of the doctor’s nerve tonic and sleeping draughts, and a little innocent diversion. To-night I am going to take you to the Savoy to supper.”

Mrs. Ashton exclaimed delightedly, and then was filled with misgivings.

“I have nothing to wear,” she protested, “and over here, in the evening, the women dress so well. I have a dinner gown,” she exclaimed, “but it’s black. Would that do?”

Ford assured her nothing could be better. He had a man’s vanity in liking a woman with whom he was seen in public to be pretty and smartly dressed, and he felt sure that in black the blond beauty of Mrs. Ashton would appear to advantage. They arranged to meet at eleven on the promenade leading to the Savoy supper-room, and parted with mutual satisfaction at the prospect.

The finding of Harry Ashton was so simple that in its very simplicity it appeared spectacular.

On leaving Mrs. Ashton, Ford engaged rooms at the Hotel Cecil. Before visiting his rooms he made his way to the American bar. He did not go there seeking Harry Ashton. His object was entirely self-centred. His purpose was to drink to himself and to the lights of London. But as though by appointment, the man he had promised to find was waiting for him. As Ford entered the room, at a table facing the door sat Ashton. There was no mistaking him. He wore a mustache, but it was no disguise. He was the same good-natured, good-looking youth who, in the photograph from under a Panama hat, had smiled upon the world. With a glad cry Ford rushed toward him.

“Fancy meeting YOU!” he exclaimed.

Mr. Ashton’s good-natured smile did not relax. He merely shook his head.

“Afraid you have made a mistake,” he said. The reporter regarded him blankly. His face showed his disappointment.

“Aren’t you Charles W. Garrett, of New York?” he demanded.

“Not me,” said Mr. Ashton.

“But,” Ford insisted in hurt tones, as though he were being trifled with, “you have been told you look like him, haven’t you?”

Mr. Ashton’s good nature was unassailable.

“Sorry,” he declared, “never heard of him.”

Ford became garrulous, he could not believe two men could look so much alike. It was a remarkable coincidence. The stranger must certainly have a drink, the drink intended for his twin. Ashton was bored, but accepted. He was well acquainted with the easy good-fellowship of his countrymen. The room in which he sat was a meeting-place for them. He considered that they were always giving each other drinks, and not only were they always introducing themselves, but saying, “Shake hands with my friend, Mr. So-and-So.” After five minutes they showed each other photographs of the children. This one, though as loquacious as the others, seemed better dressed, more “wise”; he brought to the exile the atmosphere of his beloved Broadway, so Ashton drank to him pleasantly.

“My name is Sydney Carter,” he volunteered.

As a poker-player skims over the cards in his hand, Ford, in his mind’s eye, ran over the value of giving or not giving his right name. He decided that Ashton would not have heard it and that, if he gave a false one, there was a chance that later Ashton might find out that he had done so. Accordingly he said, “Mine is Austin Ford,” and seated himself at Ashton’s table. Within ten minutes the man he had promised to pluck from among the eight million inhabitants of London was smiling sympathetically at his jests and buying a drink.

On the steamer Ford had rehearsed the story with which, should he meet Ashton, he would introduce himself. It was one arranged to fit with his theory that Ashton was a crook. If Ashton were a crook Ford argued that to at once ingratiate himself in his good graces he also must be a crook. His plan was to invite Ashton to co-operate with him in some scheme that was openly dishonest. By so doing he hoped apparently to place himself at Ashton’s mercy. He believed if he could persuade Ashton he was more of a rascal than Ashton himself, and an exceedingly stupid rascal, any distrust the bookmaker might feel toward him would disappear. He made his advances so openly, and apparently showed his hand so carelessly, that, from being bored, Ashton became puzzled, then interested; and when Ford insisted he should dine with him, he considered it so necessary to find out who the youth might be who was forcing himself upon him that he accepted the invitation.

They adjourned to dress and an hour later, at Ford’s suggestion, they met at the Carlton. There Ford ordered a dinner calculated to lull his newly made friend into a mood suited to confidence, but which had on Ashton exactly the opposite effect. Merely for the pleasure of his company, utter strangers were not in the habit of treating him to strawberries in February, and vintage champagne; and, in consequence, in Ford’s hospitality he saw only cause for suspicion. If, as he had first feared, Ford was a New York detective, it was most important he should know that. No one better than Ashton understood that, at that moment, his presence in New York meant, for the police, unalloyed satisfaction, and for himself undisturbed solitude. But Ford was unlike any detective of his acquaintance; and his acquaintance had been extensive. It was true Ford was familiar with all the habits of Broadway and the Tenderloin. Of places with which Ashton was intimate, and of men with whom Ashton had formerly been well acquainted, he talked glibly. But, if he were a detective, Ashton considered, they certainly had improved the class.

The restaurant into which for the first time Ashton had penetrated, and in which he felt ill at ease, was to Ford, he observed, a matter of course. Evidently for Ford it held no terrors. He criticised the service, patronized the head waiters, and grumbled at the food; and when, on leaving the restaurant, an Englishman and his wife stopped at their table to greet him, he accepted their welcome to London without embarrassment.