"May I give you some suggestions?" asked the count politely.
"This afternoon--after I had deciphered your notes--it took me precisely two hours by the cathedral chimes to work out the key--I ventured to revise them, and also to devise a different plan of retirement for the committee. You would care to know it?" He looked deferentially at Baggin, whose bent brows relaxed.
"Draw up your chair to the table," he said in reply. "We'll overhaul the entire proposition. There will be difficulties---- If you could invest an equal share of money----"
"I thought of that," answered the count simply. "And I fancy I can--how you say--raise the required amount. May I speak for a moment to Mr. Grayson--on a very personal matter?"
He drew the older man aside, and conversed with him briefly, in low tones.
Surprise, incredulity, displeasure chased each other across Grayson's countenance in rapid succession. "Very well," he said finally, somewhat brusquely. "You have my consent--until I see Doris."
They returned to the table. "I will be security for Count Poltavo," he declared to Baggin, "for half-a-million pounds."
In the last week of April, 1908, a notice was posted on the doors of the London, Manhattan, and Jersey Syndicate, in Moorgate Street. It was brief, but it was to the point:
"Owing to the disappearance of Mr. George T. Baggin, the L. M. and J. Syndicate has suspended operations."
With Mr. Baggin had disappeared the sum of £247,000. An examination of the books of the firm revealed the fact that the London, Manhattan, and Jersey Syndicate was--Mr. Baggin; that its imposing title thinly disguised the operations of a bucket-shop, and the vanished bullion had been most systematically collected in gold and foreign notes.
Mr. Baggin had disappeared as though the earth had swallowed him up. He was traced to Liverpool. A ticket to New York had been purchased by a man answering to his description, and he had embarked on the _Lucania_. The liner called at Queenstown, and the night she left, Mr. "Coleman" was missing. His clothing and trunks were found intact in his cabin. The ship was searched from stem to stern, but no trace of the unfortunate man could be discovered.
The evening newspapers flared forth with, "Tragic End of a Defaulting Banker," but Scotland Yard, ever sceptical, set on foot certain enquiries and learnt that a stranger had been seen in Queenstown after the ship sailed. A stranger who left for Dublin, and who doubled back to Heysham; who came, via Manchester, back to London again. In London he had vanished completely. Whether or not this was the redoubtable George T. Baggin, was a matter for conjecture.