whom Drysdale had sent on that deadly mission eight years ago.
"Then the ambush?" Drysdale bit back the words too late; against his will the fatal question had shaped itself into words.
"Ah yes—the ambush! You knew all about the ambush, didn't you? You urged me and my men to take that particular route across the desert, knowing that Ibn Said and his ruffians waited by the Well of Tiz for us! You cowardly—lying—thief!"
The last deliberately spoken words bit like ice into Drysdale's consciousness, and partly steadied his whirling thoughts.
"Thief!" he stuttered; "thief!"
"Thief—one who steals what belongs to another man," explained McCurdie, leaning forward until his eyes blazed like points of blue flame into those of his companion. Drysdale's gaze fell before them and he half rose from his seat.
"Sit still," ordered McCurdie. "I've come a long way for the pleasure of meeting you once more; and now you're going to listen!"
"Don't make a fool of yourself," sneered Drysdale, his confidence returning as he began to adjust himself to the situation. "Thief—you call me!" He shrugged his shoulders. "Jean Kennedy wras quite ready to be stolen, if that's what you mean."
"You tricked her and lied to her and deceived her! You left her to die miserably—as you left me."
"That's your own rotten imagination at work," answered Drysdale. "She went abroad the year after you—er—disappeared; no one ever heard what became of her."
"She went to Bruges—she lived at a mean little inn called Le Chat Gris—and died there when her son—and yours—was born!"
Drysdale started back, his nonchalance again stripped from him. "How the devil did you?"
McCurdie's lean brown hands toyed with the match box on the table. "I know where she lies buried in the paupers' graveyard down by the river—she and her nameless son. I know that you stopped her allowance when her reproaches annoyed you; and that she became a wretched, half-starved slave to the innkeeper, Père Grossart, and his drunken wife."
"Damn you—you paid them to tell you this fairy-tale!" blustered Drysdale.
"I have never spoken to them in my life," was the answer.
"Liar! No one else in the world could know that she—that I"
"So—you corroborate the story."
"No, curse you, I don't!" shouted Drysdale, getting to his feet. "You've found them out by accident and concocted this tale to try to ruin me."
"Before you ruin Millicent Fayne—as a climax to your varied career."
Drysdale's angry face changed, the red faded, and ugly unexpected lines appeared round his mouth. His brown eyes were suddenly hard and calculating.
"So that's your little game!" he said at last. "We're rivals once more! I did not know you had ever met Millicent," he went on. "You're going to try to use my 'guilty past' as a weapon! Very neat—I see—I see!" And turning to the whisky and soda which stood on the table, he began to fill his glass.
For a moment the other man sat very still, looking steadily at Drysdale; then, pushing back his chair, he got up and stood with his back to the glowing fire, his thin brown hands clasped behind him.
"I thought that even you would see such an obvious thing," McCurdie rejoined at last. "You'll leave here tonight—now, in fact!"
