The Pagan Madonna - Page 114/141

Cunningham sat down. "The spirit is willing, Cleigh, but the flesh is

weak. You'll never get my hide. How will you go about it? Stop a moment

and mull it over. How are you going to prove that I've borrowed the rug

and the paintings? These are your choicest possessions. You have many at

home worth more, but these things you love. Out of spite, will you inform

the British, the French, the Italian governments that you had these

objects and that I relieved you of them? In that event you'll have my

hide, but you'll never set eyes upon the oils again except upon their

lawful walls--the rug, never! On the other hand, there is every chance in

the world of my returning them to you."

"Your word?" interrupted Jane, ironically.

So Cleigh was right? A quarter of a million in art treasures!

"My word! I never before realized," continued Cunningham, "what a fine

thing it is to possess something to stand on firmly--a moral plank."

Dennison's laughter was sardonic.

"Moral plank is good," was his comment.

"Miss Norman," said Cunningham, maliciously, "I slept beside the captain

this morning, and he snores outrageously." The rogue tilted his chin and

the opal fire leaped into his eyes. "Do you want me to tell you all about

the Great Adventure Company, or do you want me to shut up and merely

proceed with the company's business without further ado? Why the devil

should I care what you think of me? Still, I do care. I want you to get my

point of view--a rollicking adventure, in which nobody loses anything and

I have a great desire fulfilled. Hang it, it's a colossal joke, and in the

end the laugh will be on nobody! Even Eisenfeldt will laugh," he added,

enigmatically.

"Do you intend to take the oils and the rug and later return them?"

demanded Jane.

"Absolutely! That's the whole story. Only Cleigh here will not believe it

until the rug and oils are dumped on the door-step of his New York home. I

needed money. Nobody would offer to finance a chart with a red cross on

it. So I had to work it out in my own fashion. The moment Eisenfeldt sees

these oils and the rug he becomes my financier, but he'll never put his

claw on them except for one thing--that act of God they mention on the

back of your ticket. Some raider may have poked into this lagoon of mine.

In that case Eisenfeldt wins."