I think I would have given a thousand pounds myself for some champagne just then. We stood holding each other, frozen into an ecstasy of listening. I almost thought that one of Bill's remarkable ears was elongating itself until it coiled sinuously towards the wall, but this, no doubt, was illusion.
There came a voice, an urbane, and cultured voice, well modulated and serene.
It was all that, but as I heard it my blood seemed to turn to red currant jelly and to circulate no more in my veins. If there was ever a voice which was informed by some unnamable quality which came straight from the red pit of hell, we heard that voice then. Hearing it, I knew for the first time the meaning of those words: _The worm that dies not and the fire that is not quenched_.
"Whoever thought, Gideon Morse, that I should be breakfasting with you to-day! To tell the truth I didn't myself. But as you know, I have always been a great gambler and now, at the end of all the games of chance that we have played together, I have turned up the final ace."
Another voice--Heaven! it was Morse himself who answered. His voice seemed almost amused. It was like coming out of a pitch dark room into summer sunlight to hear it after that other.
"Mark Antony Midwinter, you speak of triumph, but you were never nearer your ultimate end than you are at this moment"--I could have sworn I heard his dry chuckle and I moved nearer to the wall.
"This cold pheasant is quite excellent. What is the use of trying to bluff me? Your end has come and you know it. It isn't going to be a pleasant end, I expect you guess that. We have tossed the dice for many years, you and I. You've won over and over again. I had become an outcast on the face of the earth, until Fate made me the agent of a great vengeance."
"You offal-eating jackal!" he said. "Finish your stolen meal and get to work. You, the agent of a great vengeance! when not long ago you slunk into my London hotel and offered to sell your employers. I understand," he went on in a curiously impersonal voice, "that you really are supposed to be descended from a high English family. Even when I had you tarred and feathered--do you remember that, Antony?--many years ago, I still believed in your descent, though I own I didn't give it much of a thought. Tell me, where exactly did the kitchen-maid come in?"