to crime, Lygon had a new
sense of boldness, a sudden feeling of reprisal, a rushing desire to put
the screw upon him. At sight of this millionaire with the pile of notes
before him there vanished the sickening hesitation of the afternoon, of
the journey with Dupont. The look of the robust, healthy financier was
like acid in a wound; it maddened him.

"You will know me better soon," Lygon added, his head twitching with
excitement.

Henderley recognised him now. He gripped the armchair spasmodically,
but presently regained a complete composure. He knew the game that was
forward here; and he also thought that if once he yielded to blackmail
there would never be an end to it. He made no pretence, but came
straight to the point.

"You can do nothing; there is no proof," he said with firm assurance.

"There is Dupont," answered Lygon doggedly.

"Who is Dupont?"

"The French Canadian who helped me--I divided with him."

"You said the man who helped you died. You wrote that to me. I suppose
you are lying now."

Henderley coolly straightened the notes on the table, smoothing out
the wrinkles, arranging them according to their denominations with an
apparently interested eye; yet he was vigilantly watching the outcast
before him. To yield to blackmail would be fatal; not to yield to it--he
could not see his way. He had long ago forgotten the fire, and blood,
and shame. No Whisperer reminded him of that black page in the history
of his life; he had been immune of conscience. He could not understand
this man before him. It was as bad a case of human degradation as ever
he had seen--he remembered the stalwart, if dissipated, ranchman who had
acted on his instigation. He knew now that he had made a foolish blunder
then, that the scheme had been one of his failures; but he had never
looked on it as with eyes reproving crime. As a hundred thoughts tending
towards the solution of the problem by which he was faced, flashed
through his mind, and he rejected them all, he repeated mechanically the
phrase, "I suppose you are lying now."

"Dupont is here--not a mile away," was the reply. "He will give proof.
He would go to jail or to the gallows to put you there, if you do not
pay. He is a devil--Dupont."

Still the great man could not see his way out. He must temporise for a
little longer, for rashness might bring scandal or noise; and near by
was his daughter, the apple of his eye.

"What do you want? How much did you figure