morrow morning at eleven."

"I wonder what he has to say."

"I'm completely in the dark."

"I'd like to meet him."

"Shall I send him on to Roehampton after he's seen me?"

Olive reflected that Riviere might not want to see her, in view of the
way he had avoided her so far. She answered: "Ring me up on the 'phone
when he's in your office. I'll speak to him over the wire."

"Right--I'll remember.... By the way, about the Hudson Bay company, did
I tell you that the underwriting negotiations are going through fine?
Inside a week we ought to be ready for flotation."

Larssen proceeded to enlarge on the subject, and the broken thread of
Olive's avowal was not taken up again. They left the offices, and drove
back to the Cabaret to rejoin Sir Francis.

CHAPTER XX

BEATEN TO EARTH

At eleven o'clock the next morning, the shipowner was at the horseshoe
desk in his throne-room, fingering the snapshot of Riviere which
Sylvester had secured at Nimes. He had seen in it the picture of a man
very like Clifford Matheson, but not for a moment had he thought of it
as the portrait of the financier himself. The shaven lip, the scar
across the forehead, the differences of hair and collar and tie and
dress had combined to make a thorough disguise.

Yet when the visitor entered by the farther door of the throne-room and
came striding resolutely down the thirty yards of carpet, Lars Larssen
knew him. The carriage and walk were Matheson's.

For a moment hot rage possessed him. Not at Matheson, but at himself. He
ought to have guessed before. This was the one possibility he had
completely overlooked. Matheson had tricked him by shamming death. He
ought not to have let himself be tricked. That was inexcusable.

A moment later he had regained mastery of himself, and a succession of
plans flashed past his mental vision, to be considered with lightning
speed. The financier held the whip-hand--and the whip must be torn from
him ... somehow.

"Sit down, Matheson," said the shipowner calmly, when his antagonist had
reached the horseshoe desk.

Neither man offered to shake hands.

Matheson took the seat indicated, and waited for Larssen to begin.

Larssen knew the value of silence, however, and Matheson was forced to
open.

"You thought me dead?" he asked.

"I knew you had disappeared for private reasons of your own. I
discovered those reasons, and so I respected your privacy," was the calm
reply.

"You had the cool in