The House of the Arrow

MESSRS. FROBISHER & HASLITT, the solicitors on the east side of Russell
Square, counted amongst their clients a great many who had undertakings
established in France; and the firm was very proud of this branch of its
business.

"It gives us a place in history," Mr. Jeremy Haslitt used to say. "For it
dates from the year 1806, when Mr. James Frobisher, then our very
energetic senior partner, organized the escape of hundreds of British
subjects who were detained in France by the edict of the first Napoleon.
The firm received the thanks of His Majesty's Government and has been
fortunate enough to retain the connection thus made. I look after that
side of our affairs myself."

Mr. Haslitt's daily batch of letters, therefore, contained as a rule a
fair number bearing the dark-blue stamp of France upon their envelopes.
On this morning of early April, however, there was only one. It was
addressed in a spidery, uncontrolled hand with which Mr. Haslitt was
unfamiliar. But it bore the postmark of Dijon, and Mr. Haslitt tore it
open rather quickly. He had a client in Dijon, a widow, Mrs. Harlowe, of
whose health he had had bad reports. The letter was certainly written
from her house, La Maison Grenelle, but not by her. He turned to the
signature.

"Waberski?" he said, with a frown. "Boris Waberski?" And then, as he
identified his correspondent, "Oh, yes, yes."

He sat down in his chair and read. The first part of the letter was
merely flowers and compliments, but half-way down the second page its
object was made clear as glass. It was five hundred pounds. Old Mr.
Haslitt smiled and read on, keeping up, whilst he read, a one-sided
conversation with the writer.

"I have a great necessity of that money," wrote Boris, "and--"

"I am quite sure of that," said Mr. Haslitt.

"My beloved sister, Jeanne-Marie--" the letter continued.

"Sister-in-law," Mr. Haslitt corrected.

"-- cannot live for long, in spite of all the care and attention I give to
her," Boris Waberski went on. "She has left me, as no doubt you know, a
large share of her fortune. Already, then, it is mine--yes? One may say
so and be favourably understood. We must look at the facts with the eyes.
Expedite me, then, by the recommended post a little of what is mine and
agree my distinguished salutations."

Haslitt's smile became a broad grin. He had in one of his tin boxes a
copy of the will of Jeanne-Marie Harlowe drawn up in due form by her
French notary at Dijon, by which every farthing she possessed was
bequeathed without condition to her husband's niece and adopted daughter,
Betty Harlowe. Jeremy Haslitt almost destroyed that letter. He folded it;
his fingers twitched at it; there was already actually a tear at the
edges of the sheets when he changed his mind.

"No," he said to himself. "No! With the Boris Waberskis one never knows,"
and he locked the letter away on a ledge of his private safe.

He was very glad that he had when three weeks later he read, in the
obituary column of The Times, the announcement of Mrs. Harlowe's death,
and received a big card with a very deep black border in the French style
from Betty Harlowe inviting him to the funeral at Dijon. The invitation
was merely formal. He could hardly have reached Dijon in time for the
ceremony had he started off at that instant. He contented himself with
writing a few lines of sincere condolence to the girl, and a letter to
the French notary in which he placed the services of the firm at Betty's
disposal. Then he waited.

"I shall hear again from little Boris," he said, and he heard within the
week. The handwriting was more spidery and uncontrolled than ever;
hysteria and indignation had played havoc with Waberski's English; also
he had doubled his demand.

"It is outside belief," he wrote. "Nothing has she left to her so
attentive brother. There is something here I do not much like. It must be
one thousand pounds now, by the recommended post. 'You have always had
the world against you, my poor Boris,' she say with the tears all big in
her dear eyes. 'But I make all right for you in my will.' And now
nothing! I speak, of course, to my niece--ah, that hard one! She snap
her the fingers at me! Is that a behaviour? One thousand pounds, mister!
Otherwise there will be awkwardnesses! Yes! People do not snap them the
fingers at Boris Waberski without the payment. So one thousand pounds by
the recommended post or awkwardnesses"; and this time Boris Waberski did
not invite Mr. Haslitt to agree any salutations, distinguished or
otherwise, but simply signed his name with a straggling pen which shot
all over the sheet.