"Your daughter's just about to marry the most promising young man in the place," he said. "A young fellow with a career before him. Do you think he'd marry her if he knew that her father--even if it is thirty years ago--had been convicted of----" "Look you here!" interrupted Cotherstone, through set teeth. "I've had enough! I've asked you once before if you'd any more to say--now I'll put it in another fashion. For I see what you're after--and it's blackmail! How much do you want? Come on--give it a name!" "Name nothing, till you've told Mallalieu," answered Kitely. "There's no hurry. You two can't, and I shan't, run away. Time enough--I've the whip hand. Tell your partner, the Mayor, all I've told you--then you can put your heads together, and see what you're inclined to do. An annuity, now?--that would suit me." "You haven't mentioned this to a soul?" asked Cotherstone anxiously. "Bah!" sneered Kitely. "D'ye think I'm a fool? Not likely. Well--now you know. I'll come in here again tomorrow afternoon. And--you'll both be here, and ready with a proposal." He picked up his glass, leisurely drank off its remaining contents, and without a word of farewell opened the door and went quietly away. CHAPTER II CRIME--AND SUCCESS For some moments after Kitely had left him, Cotherstone stood vacantly staring at the chair in which the blackmailer had sat. As yet he could not realize things. He was only filled with a queer, vague amazement about Kitely himself. He began to look back on his relations with Kitely. They were recent--very recent, only of yesterday, as you might say. Kitely had come to him, one day about three months previously, told him that he had come to these parts for a bit of a holiday, taken a fancy to a cottage which he, Cotherstone, had to let, and inquired its rent. He had mentioned, casually, that he had just retired from business, and wanted a quiet place wherein to spend the rest of his days. He had taken the cottage, and given his landlord satisfactory references as to his ability to pay the rent--and Cotherstone, always a busy man, had thought no more about him. Certainly he had never anticipated such an announcement as that which Kitely had just made to him--never dreamed that Kitely had recognized him and Mallalieu as men he had known thirty years ago.