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Rh "I am desolated, monsieur, but … one must assume that they have considered everything. You understand, it is a matter in which I am wholly without discretion, I trust?"

"O quite!" Lanyard assented carelessly. He held out his hand. "Good-bye, my friend."

The Jew shook hands warmly.

"Good night, monsieur—and the best of luck!"

There was significance in his last words that Lanyard did not trouble to analyze. Beyond doubt, the man knew more than he dared admit. And the adventurer told himself he could shrewdly surmise most of that which the other had felt constrained to leave unspoken.

Pressure from some quarter had been brought to bear upon that eminently respectable firm of jewel dealers in Amsterdam to induce them to discontinue their clandestine relations with the Lone Wolf, profitable though these must have been.

Lanyard believed he could name the quarter whence this pressure was being exerted, but before going further or coming to any momentous decision, he was determined to know to a certainty who were arrayed against him and how much importance he need attach to their antagonism. If he failed in this, it would be the fault of the other side, not his for want of readiness to accept its invitation.

In brief, he didn't for an instant contemplate abandoning either his rigid rule of solitude or his chosen career without a fight; but he preferred not to fight in the dark.

Anger burned in him no less hotly than chagrin. It could hardly be otherwise with one who, so long suffered to