The Blotting Book Part 4

a.s.sheton isn't it. Let me look at the signature just once again."

Mr. Taynton closed his eyes a moment after looking at it. Then he took his quill, and wrote quickly.

"You would swear to that, too, would you not, Timmins?" he asked.

"Why, G.o.d bless me yes, sir," said he. "Swear to it on the book."

The door opened and as G.o.dfrey Mills came in, Mr. Taynton tweaked the paper out of Timmins's hand, and tore it up. It might perhaps seem strange to dear Mills that his partner had been forging his signature, though only in jest.

"'Fraid I'm rather late," said Mills.

"Not at all, my dear fellow," said Taynton without the slightest touch of ill-humour. "How are you? There's very little to do; I want your signature to this and this, and your careful perusal of that. Mrs.

a.s.sheton's letter? No, that only concerns me; I have dealt with it."

A quarter of an hour was sufficient, and at the end Timmins carried the papers away leaving the two partners together. Then, as soon as the door closed, Mills spoke.

"I've been thinking over our conversation of last night," he said, "and there are some points I don't think you have quite appreciated, which I should like to put before you."

Something inside Mr. Taynton's brain, the same watcher perhaps who looked at Morris so closely the evening before, said to him. "He is going to try it on." But it was not the watcher but his normal self that answered. He beamed gently on his partner.

"My dear fellow, I might have been sure that your quick mind would have seen new aspects, new combinations," he said.

Mills leaned forward over the table.

"Yes, I have seen new aspects, to adopt your words," he said, "and I will put them before you. These financial operations, shall we call them, have been going on for two years now, have they not? You began by losing a large sum in South Africans--"

"We began," corrected Mr. Taynton, gently. He was looking at the other quite calmly; his face expressed no surprise at all; if there was anything in his expression beyond that of quiet kindness, it was perhaps pity.

"I said 'you,'" said Mills in a hectoring tone, "and I will soon explain why. You lost a large sum in South Africans, but won it back again in Americans. You then again, and again contrary to my advice, embarked in perfect wild-cat affairs, which ended in our--I say 'our' here--getting severely scratched and mauled. Altogether you have frittered away 30,000, and have placed the remaining ten in a venture which to my mind is as wild as all the rest of your unfortunate ventures. These speculations have, almost without exception, been choices of your own, not mine. That was _one_ of the reasons why I said 'you,' not 'we.'"

He paused a moment.

"Another reason is," he said, "because without any exception the transactions have taken place on your advice and in your name, not in mine."

That was a sufficiently meaning statement, but Mills did not wish his partner to be under any misapprehension as to what he implied.

"In other words," he said, "I can deny absolutely all knowledge of the whole of those operations."

Mr. Taynton gave a sudden start, as if the significance of this had only this moment dawned on him, as if he had not understood the first statement. Then he seemed to collect himself.

"You can hardly do that," he said, "as I hold letters of yours which imply such knowledge."

Mills smiled rather evilly.

"Ah, it is not worth while bluffing," he said. "I have never written such a letter to you. You know it. Is it likely I should?"

Mr. Taynton apparently had no reply to this. But he had a question to ask.

"Why are you taking up this hostile and threatening att.i.tude?"

"I have not meant to be hostile, and I have certainly not threatened,"

replied Mills. "I have put before you, quite dispa.s.sionately I hope, certain facts. Indeed I should say it was you who had threatened in the matter of those letters, which, unhappily, have never existed at all. I will proceed.

"Now what has been my part in this affair? I have observed you lost money in speculations of which I disapproved, but you always knew best.

I have advanced money to you before now to tide over embarra.s.sments that would otherwise have been disastrous. By the exercise of diplomacy--or lying--yesterday, I averted a very grave danger. I point out to you also that there is nothing to implicate me in these--these fraudulent employments of a client's money. So I ask, where I come in? What do I get by it?"

Mr. Taynton's hands were trembling as he fumbled at some papers on his desk.

"You know quite well that we are to share all profits?" he said.

"Yes, but at present there have not been any. I have been, to put it plainly, pulling you out of holes. And I think--I think my trouble ought to be remunerated. I sincerely hope you will take that view also. Or shall I remind you again that there is nothing in the world to connect me with these, well, frauds?"

Mr. Taynton got up from his chair, strolled across to the window where he drew down the blind a little, so as to shut out the splash of sunlight that fell on his table.

"You have been betting again, I suppose," he asked quietly.

"Yes, and have been unfortunate. Pray do not trouble to tell me again how foolish it is to gamble like that. You may be right. I have no doubt you are right. But I think one has as much right to gamble with one's own money as to do so with the money of other people."

This apparently seemed unanswerable; anyhow Mr. Taynton made no reply.

Then, having excluded the splash of sunlight he sat down again.

"You have not threatened, you tell me," he said, "but you have pointed out to me that there is no evidence that you have had a hand in certain transactions. You say that I know you have helped me in these transactions; you say you require remuneration for your services. Does not that, I ask, imply a threat? Does it not mean that you are blackmailing me? Else why should you bring these facts--I do not dispute them--to my notice? Supposing I refuse you remuneration?"

Mills had noted the signs of agitation and anxiety. He felt that he was on safe ground. The blackmailer lives entirely on the want of courage in his victims.

"You will not, I hope, refuse me remuneration," he said. "I have not threatened you yet, because I feel sure you will be wise. I might, of course, subsequently threaten you."

Again there was silence. Mr. Taynton had picked up a quill pen, the same with which he had been writing before, for the nib was not yet dry.

"The law is rather severe on blackmailers," he remarked.

"It is. Are you going to bring an action against me for blackmail? Will not that imply the re-opening of--of certain ledgers, which we agreed last night had better remain shut?"

Again there was silence. There was a completeness in this reasoning which rendered comment superfluous.

"How much do you want?" asked Mr. Taynton.

Mills was not so foolish as to "breathe a sigh of relief." But he noted with satisfaction that there was no sign of fight in his adversary and partner.

"I want two thousand pounds," he said, "at once."

"That is a large sum."

"It is. If it were a small sum I should not trouble you."

Mr. Taynton again got up and strayed aimlessly about the room.

"I can't give it you to-day," he said. "I shall have to sell out some stock."