e you? There!'

'That's better! Nothing like candour, my young investigator. But I am
afraid, having no authority, I cannot assist you at all. Better try
Herr Boehme again. I'm only a casual onlooker.'

'With shares.'

'Ah! you remember that? (He remembers everything!) With a few shares,
then; but with no expert knowledge. Now, Boehme is the consulting
engineer. Rescue me, Boehme.'

'I cannot disclaim expert knowledge,' said Boehme, with humorous
gravity; 'but I disclaim responsibility. Now, Herr Dollmann is
chairman of the company.'

'And I,' said Dollmann, with a noisy laugh, 'must fall back on the
shareholders, whose interests I have to guard. One can't be too
careful in these confidential matters.'

'Here's one who gives his consent,' I said. 'Can't he represent the
rest?'

'Extorted by torture,' said von Bruening. 'I retract.'

'Don't mind them, Herr Carruthers,' cried Frau Dollmann, 'they are
making fun of you; but I will give you a hint; no woman can keep a
secret--'

'Ah!' I cried, triumphantly, 'you have been there?'

'I? Not I; I detest the sea! But Clara has.' Everyone looked at
Clara, who in her turn looked in naive bewilderment from me to her
father.

'Indeed?' I said, more soberly, 'but perhaps she is not a free
agent.'

'Perfectly free!' said Dollmann.

'I have only been there once, some time ago,' said she, 'and I saw no
gold at all.'

'Guarded,' I observed. 'I beg your pardon; I mean that perhaps you
only saw what you were allowed to see. And, in any case, the fraulein
has no expert knowledge and no responsibility, and, perhaps, no
shares. Her province is to be charming, not to hold financial
secrets.'

'I have done my best to help you,' said the stepmother.

'They're all against us, Davies.'

'Oh, chuck it, Carruthers!' said Davies, in English.

'He's insatiable,' said von Bruening, and there was a pause; clearly,
they meant to elicit more.

'Well, I shall draw my own conclusions,' I said.

'This is interesting,' said von Bruening, 'in what sense?'

'It begins to dawn on me that you made fools of us at Bensersiel.
Don't you remember, Davies, what an interest he took in all our
doings? I wonder if he feared our exploring propensities might
possibly lead us to Memmert?'

'Upon my word, this is the blackest ingratitude. I thought I made
myself particularly agreeable to you.'

'Yes, indeed; especially about the duck shooting! How useful your
local man would have been--both