wrong, Mr. Dean?"

The cashier hesitated and glanced at Laverick.

"Nothing much," Laverick answered. "We should have liked to have
asked him a question - that is all."

Bellamy came out from the hotel and paused to light a cigarette.

"How are you, Laverick?" he said quietly. "Nothing the matter, I
hope?"

"Nothing worth mentioning," Laverick replied.

The cashier returned to his duties. The two men were alone.
Bellamy, most carefully dressed, with his silver-headed cane under
his arm, and his silk hat at precisely the correct angle, seemed
very far removed from the work of intrigue into which Laverick
felt himself to have blundered. He looked down for a moment at the
tips of his patent shoes and up again at the sky, as though anxious
about the weather.

"What about a drink, Laverick?" he asked nonchalantly.

"Delighted!" Laverick assented.




CHAPTER XXXI