Mulliner Nights Read Online Free Page A

am right?’ he asked, giving
the cheque-book a twitch.
    ‘Quite right,’
said Adrian.
    ‘You won’t
mention this little plan of mine to anyone? You will keep it as just a secret
between ourselves? If, for instance, any of your cronies at Scotland Yard
should express curiosity as to my whereabouts, you will plead ignorance?’
    ‘Certainly.’
    ‘Capital!’
said Sir Jasper, relieved. ‘And there is one other thing. I gather from
Brangbolton that you are anxious to marry Lady Millicent yourself. And, as by
the time of the wedding I shall doubtless be in — well, Callao is a spot that
suggests itself off-hand, I would like to give you my little wedding-present
now.
    He scribbled
hastily in his cheque-book, tore out a page and handed it to Adrian.
    ‘Remember!’ he
said. ‘Not a word to anyone!’
    ‘Quite,’ said
Adrian.
    He watched the
financier disappear in the direction of the garage, regretting that he could
have misjudged a man who so evidently had much good in him. Presently the sound
of a motor engine announced that the other was on his way. Feeling that one
obstacle, at least, between himself and his happiness had been removed, Adrian
strolled indoors to see what the rest of the party were doing.
    It was a
quiet, peaceful scene that met his eyes as he wandered into the library.
Overruling the request of some of the members of the company for a rubber of
bridge, Lord Brangbolton had gathered them together at a small table and was
initiating them into his favourite game of Persian Monarchs.
    ‘It’s
perfectly simple, dash it,’ he was saying. ‘You just take the pack and cut. You
bet — let us say ten pounds — that you will cut a higher card than the feller
you’re cutting against. And, if you do, you win, dash it. And, if you don’t,
the other dashed feller wins. Quite clear, what?’
    Somebody said
that it sounded a little like Blind Hooky.
    ‘It is like
Blind Hooky,’ said Lord Brangbolton. ‘Very like Blind Hooky. In fact, if you
can play Blind Hooky, you can play Persian Monarchs.’
    They settled
down to their game, and Adrian wandered about the room, endeavouring to still
the riot of emotion which his recent interview with Sir Jasper Addleton had
aroused in his bosom. All that remained for him to do now, he reflected, was by
some means or other to remove the existing prejudice against him from Lord
Brangbolton’s mind.
    It would not
be easy, of course. To begin with, there was the matter of his straitened
means.
    He suddenly
remembered that he had not yet looked at the cheque which the financier had
handed him. He pulled it out of his pocket.
    And, having
glanced at it, Adrian Mulliner swayed like a poplar in a storm.
    Just what he
had expected, he could not have said. A fiver, possibly. At the most, a tenner.
Just a trifling gift, he had imagined, with which to buy himself a
cigarette-lighter, a fish-slice, or an egg-boiler.
    The cheque was
for a hundred thousand pounds. So great was the shock that, as Adrian caught
sight of himself in the mirror opposite to which he was standing, he scarcely
recognized the face in the glass. He seemed to be seeing it through a mist.
Then the mist cleared, and he saw not only his own face clearly, but also that
of Lord Brangbolton, who was in the act of cutting against his left-hand
neighbour, Lord Knubble of Knopp.
    And, as he
thought of the effect this sudden accession of wealth must surely have on the
father of the girl he loved, there came into Adrian’s face a sudden, swift
smile.
    And
simultaneously from behind him he heard a gasping exclamation, and, looking in
the mirror, he met Lord Brangbolton’s eyes. Always a little prominent, they
were now almost prawn-like in their convexity.
    Lord Knubble
of Knopp had produced a bank-note from his pocket and was pushing it along the
table.
    ‘Another ace!’
he exclaimed. ‘Well I’m dashed!’
    Lord
Brangbolton had risen from his chair.
    ‘Excuse me,’
he said in a strange, croaking voice. ‘I just