e, for he
was then almost as difficult to move as one of my own countrymen, I
extracted the tale--simple in its extravagance, extravagant in its
simplicity. It seemed that Hackman of the British Museum had been
staying with him about ten days before, boasting of scarabs. Hackman has
a way of carrying really priceless antiquities on his tie-ring and in
his trouser pockets. Apparently, he had intercepted something on its way
to the Boulak Museum which, he said, was "a genuine Amen-Hotepa queen's
scarab of the Fourth Dynasty." Now Wilton had bought from Cassavetti,
whose reputation is not above suspicion, a scarab of much the same
scarabeousness, and had left it in his London chambers. Hackman at a
venture, but knowing Cassavetti, pronounced it an imposition. There was
long discussion--savant versus millionaire, one saying: "ut I know it
cannot be"; and the other: "But I can and will prove it." Wilton found
it necessary for his soul's satisfaction to go up to town, then and
there,--a forty-mile run,--and bring back the scarab before dinner. It
was at this point that he began to cut corners with disastrous results.
Amberley Royal station being five miles away, and putting in of horses a
matter of time, Wilton had told Howard, the immaculate butler, to signal
the next train to stop; and Howard, who was more of a man of resource
than his master gave him credit for, had, with the red flag of the
ninth hole of the links which crossed the bottom of the lawn, signalled
vehemently to the first down-train; and it had stopped. Here Wilton's
account became confused. He attempted, it seems, to get into that
highly indignant express, but a guard restrained him with more or
less force--hauled him, in fact, backyards from the window of a locked
carriage. Wilton must have struck the gravel with some vehemence, for
the consequences, he admitted, were a free fight on the line in which he
lost his hat, and was at last dragged into the guard's van and set down
breathless.

He had pressed money upon the man, and very foolishly had explained
everything but his name. This he clung to, for he had a vision of
tall head-lines in the New York papers, and well knew no son of Merton
Sargent could expect mercy that side the water. The guard, to Wilton's
amazement, refused the money on the grounds that this was a matter
for the Company to attend to. Wilton insisted on his incognito, and,
therefore, found two policemen waiting for him at St. Botolph term