Chapter XXIII: Shows How One May Sometimes Wish Old Friends Elsewhere

At this strange recognition, Arthur Wharton fell back a pace, and stared in amazement at the two men. "A very natural mistake, M. Smerloff," he heard Pasquett answer, "but my name is not Radlett, but John Pasquett." But the words were stammeringly spoken; Pasquett had been thrown manifestly off his balance by the encounter.

"It is, of course, entirely your affair by what name you are called," said the Russian. Then he turned to Arthur. "In the circumstances, it would perhaps be best if I left you."

"No," cried Arthur. "There must be some explanation of this extraordinary affair, and I mean to hear it. Do you agree, Jack? May I ask M. Smerloff some questions?"

Pasquett--if that was his name (let us go on calling him by it till we make sure)--nodded. "Ask him," he said, "and then I will tell you all about it."

Arthur turned to the Russian. "Why did you address my friend as Radlett?" he asked.

"Because to the best of my belief that is his name."

"Why do you think that?"

"He is the man I met in India, as I told you. He said then he was Hugh Radlett, and he got Hugh Radlett's papers from me. I recognised him as a man whom I had seen in the prison in Turkestan. If he is not Hugh Radlett, who is he?"

"You are sure he is not John Pasquett?"

"I have told you. John Pasquett is dead."

"But this man and Hugh Radlett have been together since in Reval. Radlett was murdered in London some months ago."

"Then I don't know who he is. I only know that he told me he was Hugh Radlett." The Russian turned to Pasquett. "Didn't you?" he asked.

"I did," was the answer, "but I'm John Pasquett for all that."

Arthur made an appeal. "Jack, if you have an explanation, for God's sake tell me. Why on earth did you pretend to be Radlett?"

"Isn't it obvious, Arthur? Hugh and I escaped from prison. We were compelled to leave all our papers behind, including those valuable plans of the concession. Then I met this fellow by accident in the streets of Bombay. I could have given him away to the Indian Government as a Bolshie agent. But I wanted those papers, so I came to terms with him. I promised that if he would leave the country at once after getting me the papers, I wouldn't tell on him. He agreed. But he wouldn't have let me have Radlett's papers unless he had believed that I was Radlett. So I pretended to be Radlett. Hugh fully approved when I told it to him afterwards."

"Where was Radlett when this happened?"

"Away from Bombay up at Simla seeing some Government chap."

Arthur thought a minute. "Yes," he said then, "but why did you want a copy of your own death certificate?"

This question again found Pasquett without a ready answer. Then he laughed. "Oh," he said, "I thought I might as well play out my little joke to the end."

"Your little joke?"

"Yes, pretending to be dead. Of course, it wasn't either Radlett's body or mine Dr. Borsin found."

"Whose was it, then?"

"Another poor devil's, who escaped with us. I pretended it was mine, and Hugh Radlett wrote that note you've got in order to make M. Smerloff think so."

"But," said Smerloff, "no one else escaped with you."

"Oh, yes, they did," said Pasquett, "even if you were never told. It was a Russian fellow, called something like Skitaletz, or Skerovic. I forget the exact name."

Smerloff shrugged his shoulders. "You have a ready imagination," he said, "but it is no business of mine."

"It is of mine, though," said Arthur. "Jack, do you swear all this is true? I ask you again. Are you John Pasquett?"

"Arthur, I swear to you that I am John Pasquett, and, if you don't believe me, I can easily prove it to you--when we get back to civilisation. There are plenty of people in America who knew me years ago."

"But aren't there some people who knew you here in Siberia, before you went to prison? Or who knew you in prison, as Pasquett?"

"I dare say; but no one I could find. Come, Arthur, take my word for it. Haven't I explained the whole mistake? Be friends, do."

"Jack, I'm your friend, whoever you are, and I think I do believe you. M. Smerloff, I am sorry to have dragged you in this way into our affairs."

The Russian bowed. "I wish you good-night, gentlemen," he said. "You are at liberty to call yourselves what you like so far as I am concerned. But pardon me if I find your habits a little confusing. However, it is not my way to meddle with other people's business. I shall say nothing about our little encounter." Bowing gravely, he left them together.

* * * * *

"Let's have a breath of fresh air, Jack," said Arthur. Pasquett said nothing, and the two men strolled out to the door of the hotel together. As they stood beneath the lamp in the entrance a man passed them. He caught sight of Pasquett's face, and stopped. A smile of pleased recognition came into his face. "Hallo, Jack," he said, "where on earth have you been in all these years?" A great surge of relief swept through Arthur's mind as he heard this greeting. An old friend had turned up to identify Pasquett in the nick of time.

* * * * *

Pasquett looked at the stranger and laughed--a short, cynical laugh. "Hallo, Billy," he said. "The same to you. I'm mining again--up the river. What are you doing?"

"Same old game," said the newcomer. "Got a dinky little mine out towards Krasnoyarsk. I'm manager now, old chap, under these Soviet blighters. Same slavedriver, I don't think, in this blinking land of the free. Come in and have a drink."

"Let me introduce my friend, Mr. Arthur Wharton," said Pasquett. "Arthur, this is Mr. Billy Southern, who used to be my under-manager in my old mine. You'll join us, won't you?"

Arthur shook Billy Southern warmly by the hand, and expressed his pleasure at the meeting. He was, indeed, inexpressibly relieved. The three men went back togther into the hotel.

Inside he sat still and listened, taking little part in the conversation, while the two old friends exchanged their reminiscences. Billy Southern, it appeared, had left the mines at the beginning of the war, and taken service as an engineer in the Russian army. He had been through the war and the revolutions, and had come back to the mines as the servant of the Soviet Government. He had no politics: he treated the whole change in Russia as a matter of no concern, save as it had affected him as soldier and industrial manager. He found labour easier to manage under Soviet conditions than under capitalist enterprise before the war. The Bolshies, he said, were "funny guys," but they did seem to mean business.

Pasquett and Southern talked long. They were both good talkers, and they had a lot to say to each other. Arthur was an interested listener. Every now and then one or other of them brought him into the conversation by asking his opinion, but he knew little of the things of which they were speaking. He listened eagerly, feeling that he got to know and like Jack Pasquett better with every fresh light on his character that was revealed. Billy Southern had evidently a vast admiration for his old chief. It was late when at length he rose to go. "Well, so long, Jack Pearson," he said, "it's like old times to have had this crack with you again." He turned to Arthur to say good-bye, and noticed that he was not himself. "Why, what's the matter?" he said.

Arthur, who had been completely reassured by the conversation, had suddenly been plunged into consternation by hearing Southern address his friend, not as Jack Pasquett, or even as Hugh Radlett, but by a totally new and unexpected name.

"Mr. Southern," he said, "I must ask you a question. Why do you call my friend 'Jack Pearson'?"

Southern stared at him in surprise. "Why," he said, "Jack Pearson's his name. Ain't it, Jack? What in hell is he driving at?"

Pasquett answered swiftly. "It's like this, Billy. You see, my real name is John Pasquett, though you always knew me as 'Jack Pearson.' Arthur here knows me only by my real name. So he's naturally a bit perplexed."

"I get you. But I don't see why he need make all that fuss about it. Any chap might want to change his name, and why not? That's what I say."

"Well, anyway, Arthur, that's the truth," said Pasquett. "So long, Billy. _Au revoir._" The two men shook hands, and then John Pasquett turned back to face Arthur again.

* * * * *

"Now, Jack," said Arthur, "I've made up my mind. No, don't interrupt. I hope we're as good friends as ever, but I don't believe you're John Pasquett, and I don't believe you've got any right to Radlett's money or to the concession. I'm sorry, old chap, but it's best to be plain. I'm glad your name is Jack, whatever else it is."

"My dear Arthur, you're really quite wrong. I am John Pasquett, though I was working under a false name in Siberia before the war. You wonder why. Well, I left America in a hurry--under a charge--a false charge. It's all cleared up now, but for the time I thought it best to change my name. I wanted to bury the past. Hugh Radlett used a false name, too. Come, now, you don't think any the worse of him for it. Lots of people use names that aren't their own."

"You've got too many _aliases_, Jack. I can't really swallow it all. Sorry, but there it is. And I shall have to tell my uncle what I think. You do see, don't you, I can't go on working the concession as if nothing had happened. If you aren't John Pasquett, our right--the Anglo-Asiatic's I mean--to the concession lapses. I'm responsible here for the Anglo-Asiatic's interests. You see, I must tell him."

"Oh, hell!" said Pasquett. Then, seeing Arthur's melancholy expression, he added, "It's all right, really." He laid his hand on Arthur's. "I've sworn to you, Arthur, that I am Pasquett, and it's quite true. But I won't get angry with you for doubting me. I'm not surprised. Any one might. There's only one thing for it. You must hold your hand till the work is far enough advanced for us to leave old Alison in charge here, and go to fetch Norah. Wait till then, Arthur.

"I can _prove_ to you--_prove_, mind--when I get there, that I am Pasquett. Will you promise to do nothing till then? It really is quite all right. Honour bright!"

"Sorry, Jack, I can't. That'll mean the Anglo-Asiatic will go on spending money on the concession. No, I must cable to my uncle telling him. I mean I must tell him there is doubt about the soundness of the concession, and get him to stop expenditure as far as he can till the thing is cleared up. I won't tell him I doubt your identity, till you have a chance to prove it."

Pasquett thought. Then he said, "It will be worst of all if you imperil the concession like that. Such a message from you, if it came out, would send the shares down with a run, and ruin everything. If you must tell, you had much better tell him the whole thing--in confidence. Tell him you doubt whether I am John Pasquett, and on what grounds. Then leave him to judge what he had better do."

"You want me to do that?" exclaimed Arthur, thoroughly surprised.

"Yes, just that or nothing. And I shall also write to Lord Ealing at once, if you write, and put my side of the case. Really, Arthur, you are being absurd. If we were in Paris or London I could prove my identity to you in five minutes. But I can't possibly leave here till the early autumn."

"It won't do, Jack. I must go home at once, and report to Lord Ealing. And you must come with me."

"No; I won't leave the work here. My dear fellow, I know it's perfectly O.K., and you'll find that out as soon as we get back to England and you see my proofs."

"Alison could manage here well enough. Come with me, Jack."

"No, I'm not going to be taken from my work over a _canard_ like this."

On that day, Arthur's entreaties failed to move Pasquett, as Pasquett's failed to move him. He agreed indeed to sleep on the whole question, and to put off writing to Lord Ealing till the following day. But sleeping on it only confirmed his determination. He told Pasquett definitely that he had decided to write to his uncle telling his doubts, and to start for London at once, whether or not Pasquett chose to accompany him. He could not bear, he said, to go on living with Pasquett with the whole question unsettled, and he could not take the responsibility of letting expenditure on the concession go on without an attempt to clear matters up at once. Lord Ealing would have to take the responsibility of either carrying on or stopping the work until his arrival. He asked Pasquett, if he could prove his identity, to place in his hands the means of verifying his proofs--introductions to old friends who had known him in earlier days, access to any relevant papers, and anything else that would be of use. He must go; didn't Jack see that he had no alternative?

Pasquett heard him out without interruption. When Arthur had done, he said, "No, I don't see at all. I think you might trust me enough to wait. But, if you have made up your mind, I know you won't change it. So I suppose I shall have to come back with you, though it will play the deuce with the work here."

"I can't tell you, Jack," said Arthur, "how glad I am you're coming with me. It makes me much more inclined to believe this is all a ghastly mistake."

"Not enough to put it off, I suppose? Look here, Arthur, if you insist on going, I'll come too. But for the last time I ask you to put it off."

Arthur Wharton, however, stuck to his point. Some of his friends were in the habit of saying he was a pig-headed fellow, when he once made up his mind. After a few days of preparation, the two men set off overland together for Europe. There was a constraint between them now, but their friendship remained as strong as ever. Several times on the long journey it seemed to Arthur that Pasquett was on the point of making some revelation. He kept on, as it were, trying Arthur to see how he would be likely to take something, if he made up his mind to tell. But, when it came to the point, Pasquett always sheered off, and the fact that Arthur was conscious of these half-approaches to a revelation inevitably deepened his suspicions that something was seriously wrong. He made all sorts of wild surmises. Was his friend, whom he loved well in spite of his suspicions, really a swindler who had cleverly got possession of Hugh Radlett's fortune? It looked like that, and, if he was, might there not be even worse things behind? His uneasy mind suggested to him all manner of dark suspicions. He put them from him, but they thronged back to haunt him. And yet, the worse his thoughts of Pasquett, somehow the greater his affection grew. Arthur was thoroughly unhappy during that journey, whereas John Pasquett seemed in the best of spirits, and made many an ineffectual effort to cheer his friend. Was it that he was conscious of innocence, or that he was going to see Norah again, or merely that he was confident of pulling off a gigantic bluff? Arthur could not tell. He groaned in spirit, perplexed between fear and love.