Page:Knaves of Diamonds.pdf/94

 Half-a-million apiece—whew! Why don't they ask for the whole caboodle at once? I'll see them selling fried fish first!"

The explanation of this resolution may be briefly given as follows. Thanks to exemplary behaviour and a certain amount of judiciously applied influence, Mr. Mosenstein's scapegoat had got off with a little over three years. The day he came out he received the welcome but not unexpected intelligence that, through the death of a relative in London, he had come into about five thousand pounds ready cash, and property and securities yielding about another thousand a year.

The same evening he renewed the acquaintance of Frank Ridley, who had been discharged without any assigned reason a few weeks after the great coup which had proved so worthless to him. The bank had been advised by cable that a leaf had been stolen