“May we not substitute ’woman’?” I asked.  “I am afraid your quarter of a million would not last very long if you had much to do with Mademoiselle Beaumarais.”

“So you have heard of her, have you?” he answered.  “But you need have no fear.  Dog does not eat dog, and that charming lady will not despoil me of very much!  Now to another matter!  What amount do you think your clients would feel inclined to take in full settlement of their claim upon me?”

“I cannot say,” I answered.  “How many of the gems have you realized upon?”

“There were ninety-three originally,” he said when he had consulted his pocket-book, “and I have sold sixty, which leaves a balance of thirty-three, all of which are better than any I have yet disposed of.  Will your clients be prepared to accept fifty thousand pounds, of course, given without prejudice.”

“Your generosity amazes me,” I answered.  “My clients, your partners, are to take twenty-five thousand pounds apiece, while you get off, scot-free, after your treatment of them, with two hundred thousand.”

“They may consider themselves lucky to get anything at all,” he retorted.  “Run your eye over the case, and see how it stands.  You must know as well as I do that they haven’t a leg to stand upon.  If I wanted to be nasty, I should say let them prove that they have a right to the stones.  They can’t call in the assistance of the law——­”

“Why not?”

“Because to get even with me it would be necessary for them to make certain incriminating admissions, and to call certain evidence that would entail caustic remarks from a learned judge, and would not improbably lead to a charge of murder being preferred against them.  No, Mr. Fairfax, I know my own business, and, what is better, I know theirs.  If they like to take fifty thousand pounds, and will retire into obscurity upon it, I will pay it to them, always through you.  But I won’t see either of them, and I won’t pay a halfpenny more than I have offered.”

“You don’t mean to tell me that you are in earnest?”

“I am quite in earnest,” he answered.  “I never was more so.  Will you place my offer before them, or will you not?”

“I will write and also wire them to-day,” I said.  “But I think I know exactly what they will say.”

“Point out the applicability of the moral concerning the bird in the hand.  If they don’t take what they can get now, the time may come when there may be nothing at all.  I never was a very patient man, and I can assure you most confidentially, that I am about tired of this game.”

“But how am I to know that this is not another trick on your part, and that you won’t be clearing out of Paris within a few hours?  I should present a sorry picture if my clients were to accept your generous offer, and I had to inform them that you were not on hand to back it up.”

“Oh, you needn’t be afraid about that,” he said with a laugh.  “I am not going to bilk you.  Provided you play fair by me, I will guarantee to do the same by you.  With the advantages I at present enjoy, I am naturally most anxious to know that I can move about Europe unmolested.  Besides, you can have me watched, and so make sure of me.  There is that beautiful myrmidon of yours, who is so assiduously making love to Mademoiselle Beaumarais’s maid.  Give him the work.”