He sent him home one day in a new car--a present to his wife.
She has never ridden in it and she made her husband return it."
"I know," Wingate muttered. "I've heard a little of this, and seen it,
too."
"Well, there you are," Kendrick concluded. "You know Phipps. You know
what it must seem like to him to have another man step in, just as he may
have been flattering himself that he was gaining ground. He hated you
before. He'd give his soul, if he had one to break you now."
"He'll do what he can, Ken," said Wingate, with a smile, as he left the
office, "but you may take it that the odds are a trifle on us.--Not later
than one-thirty, then."
"There is no doubt," he remarked a moment later, as he stepped into his
car, where Josephine was waiting for him, "that we are at war."
She laughed quietly. The excitement of those last few minutes in the
offices of the British and Imperial Granaries had acted like a stimulant.
She had lost entirely her tense and depressed air. The colour of her eyes
was newly discovered in the light that played there.
"You couldn't have fired the first shot in more dramatic fashion," she
declared. "Even Mr. Phipps lost his nerve for a moment, and I thought
that Henry was going to collapse altogether. I wonder what they are
doing now."
"Ringing up Scotland Yard, or on their way there, I should think,"
Wingate replied.
Pages:
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164