Theatre crows were pressing along Piccadilly and s
down through the Haymarket, pouring into buses and tubes and taxis. Dark massy clouds were sailing in sullen sqaudrons across the moon and there was a warm smell of rain in the air.
"Rather a good show, wasn't it? I thought that new girl was awfully clever----wonderfully versatile for a newcomer."
A tall and very beautiful girl, with a mass of shinning brown hair crowning the clear contour of her face, glance up at her mother for confirmation as they made their way to the car park behind Leicester Square.
"very clever indeed, Mercia. and quite charming she actually contrived not to look ugly even when singing the highest of her top notes. A decided accomplishment".
Both women were beautifully gowned , the younger one in a swathing miracle of silver tissues which in the electric glare of the great arc lamps, flashed an occasional glint if powder blue. her mother was dressed more sedately. She carried herself with a regal air and she looked her part splendidly from the crown of her Bond Street coiffured head to the tips of her satin shoes.
She glanced half-humorously at her daughter whose eyes were busily ranging ahead among the crowds of cars and people.
"Not expecting to see Mr. Dain tonight, are you?" she asked banteringly.
Mercia was guilty of a sudden suspicion of a blush.
"No." She laughed. "I was looking for the car --- I don't think Mr. Dain knew I was going to a theatre tonight. And it's doubtful if he would look for me here. He---he isn't very fond of crowds."
"Is he calling tonight, dear?"
"I don't think so; I really don't think so. He's such a-----such a-----how can I put it?-----such an unusual sort of man you know. Quite unlike anything I've ever experienced."
"Shy?"
"Oh no; not quite that. But----reserved somehow. I never feel that I know anything about him. I always get the curious impression that whenever he's talking, he is never talking about the thing that is really in his mind. Odd, isn't it?"
"One of the oddities if a superfluity of brains my dear."
"I expect that's it. He seems to exist in the midst of a tremendous preoccupation. and yet, somehow-----"
Mercia's voice trailed off on a note of worried indecision.
Her mother, motherly observant and maternally discreet in every way saw the signs of difficulties ahead and gave the conversation a deft half twist, not enough to be too obvious but just enough to get back to firmer ground.
"He's a frightfully busy man isn't he?" She said casually.
"What new marvel is he engaged upon now? something highly startling, I suppose?"
Mercia smiled. " I don't know at all," she said; " he very rarely speaks of his tasks----he doesn't like talking about possibilities at all until they're a fait accompli. I wouldn't be surprised though if he isn't trying to find a way of preventing ladders in silk stockings. something utterly impossible, I'll be bound. Look-----there's our car."
She signalled to the chauffeur and a minute later they were whirling away to Greydene, the great house on the Northern Heights where Mercia, twenty-five years earlier, had first opened her infant eyes to the world. they were still talking about Valmon Dain and the queer mixture of nature's that went to the moulding of his personality when they sat down to supper.
And Dain, silent in the shadowed gloom of his room above Kingsway, took off a pair of headphones and withdrew a contact key from a tiny polished dial to which his phones were connected. There was scarcely a sound in the room, save the dull humming of the dynamos.
His brow was damp with perspiration, for the room was oppressively hoy. There was a quiet speculative look in his eyes when he put the instruments down and he was muttering to himself disjointedly, ad though his real thoughts were having a harassing tug-of-war with some other matter of pressing importance.
"Lyall, Lyall," he muttered. "There can't be two Willard Lyall in London... at least , not in Highgate.... and in that area.... and the Yard won't be through again for another hour..... Willard Lyall.... doesn't seem possible.... and the Yard got intimation no. 34 by the nine o'clock delivery... in a fearful stew about it....phew, it's hot tonight... never dreamed it was so late.. half past eleven... and they went to the Royal tonight... they said so... They'll be an hour yet before they retire... might have time if I rushed... just about... the Yard will have to go hang... pity... great pity... might have got a line on Lyall... be too late then... oh, well"