Mrs. Conroy replied by extending her hand.
"To keep my secret from every one--from _him_," she said earnestly.
Then these two artful ones shook hands with a heartfelt and loyal admiration and belief for each other that I fear more honest folks might have profited by, and Mr. Dumphy went off to dine.
As Mrs. Conroy closed the front door, Olly came running in from the back piazza. Mrs. Conroy caught her in her arms and discharged her pent-up feelings, and, let us hope, her penitence, in a joyful and passionate embrace. But Olly struggled to extricate herself. When at last she got her head free, she said angrily--
"Who--Mr. Dumphy?" asked Mrs. Conroy, still holding the child, with a half-hysterical laugh.
"Yes. Gabe said he was here. Let me go, I say!"
"What do you want with him?" asked her captor with shrill gaiety.
"Gabe says--Gabe says--let me go, will you? Gabe says he knew"----
"My dear, dear sister Grace! There! I didn't mean to hurt you--but I must go!"
And she did, leaving the prospective possessor of two and a half millions, vexed, suspicious, and alone.
Peter Dumphy was true to his client. A few days after he had returned to San Francisco he dispatched a note to Victor, asking an interview. He had reasoned that, although Victor was vanquished and helpless regarding the late discovery at One Horse Gulch, yet his complicity with Mrs. Conroy's earlier deceit might make it advisable that his recollection of that event should be effaced. He was waiting a reply when a card was brought to him by a clerk. Mr. Dumphy glanced at it impatiently, and read the name of "Arthur Poinsett." Autocrat as Dumphy was in his own counting house and business circle, the name was one of such recognised power in California that he could not ignore its claims to his attention. More than that, it represented a certain respectability and social elevation which Dumphy, with all his scepticism and democratic assertion, could not with characteristic shrewdness afford to undervalue. He said, "Show him in," without lifting his head from the papers that lay upon his desk.
The door opened again to an elegant-looking young man, who lounged carelessly into the awful presence without any of that awe with which the habitual business visitors approached Peter Dumphy. Indeed, it was possible that never before had Mr. Dumphy's door opened to one who was less affected by the great capitalist's reputation. Nevertheless, with the natural ease of good breeding, after depositing his hat on the table, he walked quietly to the fireplace, and stood with his back toward it with courteous, but perhaps too indifferent patience. Mr. Dumphy was at last obliged to look up.