something wrong with the two coins.

"We must suspend judgment for the present," he said. "Still, I feel
absolutely certain that there is some trick here, though what the
scheme is I am utterly at a loss to know. Will you come in this evening
after dinner and take your coffee and cigar with me? My wife is dining
with me, but it was an express stipulation that she should go directly
dinner is over."

At a little after seven Venner was impatiently waiting the coming of
Vera. He was not altogether sorry to notice that the dining-room was
filling up more rapidly than it had done for some days past. Perhaps, on
the whole, there would be safety in numbers. Venner had secured a little
table for two on the far side of the room, and he stood in the doorway
now, waiting somewhat restlessly and impatiently for Vera to appear. He
was not a little anxious and nervous in case something should happen at
the last moment to prevent his wife's appearance. As a rule, Venner was
not a man who was troubled much with nerves, though he became conscious
of the fact that he possessed them to-night.

Was ever a man so strangely placed as himself, he wondered? He marvelled,
too, that he could sit down so patiently without asserting his rights. He
was the possessor of ample means, and if money stood in the way he was
quite prepared to pay Fenwick his price.

On these somewhat painful meditations Vera intruded. She was simply
dressed in white, and had no ornaments beyond a few flowers. Her face was
flushed now, and there was in her eyes a look of something that
approached happiness.