“Absolutely certain,” Littleson answered.  “I had a letter from him dated Paris only yesterday.”

“Then who in God’s name is shaking the Chicago markets like this!” Bardsley declared, striking the newspaper which lay by his side with the palm of his hand.  “You notice, too, the stocks which are being hit are all ours, every one of them.  Damn!  If Phineas should be sitting up there in his room with that hideous little smile upon his lips, talking and talking across the wires hour after hour, while we hang round like idiots and play his game!  It’s maddening to think of.”

“Oh, rot!” Littleson declared.  “You can imagine everything if you try.  There are the doctor’s bulletins!  We’ve had a dozen detectives all round the place, and there is not a single murmur of his having been seen by any one, or known to have even dictated a letter.”

“I’ve never known him sick for a day in my life,” Bardsley said thickly.

“It must come some time,” Littleson answered.  “It’s always these men who’ve never been ill at all, who come down suddenly.  I’m not going to worry myself about nothing.  Our only mistake was in the way that child was handled.  I think Weiss frightened her.”

Weiss shrugged his shoulders.

“Perhaps I did,” he said.  “You see I’m not a fashionable young spark like you.  Why the devil don’t you go and call on her?  It’s only a civil thing to do.  You are supposed to be one of her uncle’s greatest friends, and he’s supposed to be dangerously ill.  Go and call on her this afternoon.  Put on your best clothes and your Paris manners.  You ought to be able to get something out of a child from the backwoods.  If you talk to her cleverly you can at least find out whether Phineas is playing the game or not.”

Littleson nodded.

“I’ll call directly after lunch,” he said.  “Perhaps I could get her to come out for a ride.  I’ll try, anyhow, and ring you fellows up afterwards at the club.”

“Don’t bother her any more about the paper,” Weiss said.  “She’ll get suspicious at once if you do.  Try and make friends with her.  This thing may drag on for a week or so.”

Littleson nodded and left them soon afterwards.  He went to his rooms, changed into calling attire, and before four o’clock his automobile was outside the mansion in Fifth Avenue, and he himself waiting in the drawing-room for Virginia.  She came to him with very little delay, and welcomed him quite naturally.

“I am afraid,” he said, “that you must look upon callers as rather a nuisance just now, but we are all very anxious about your uncle, and I thought I would like to hear something more than that little bulletin outside tells us.”

She motioned him to sit down.

“You are very kind,” she said.  “My uncle is really about the same.  The doctor thinks he may be able to get up in about a week.”

“Is there any—­specific disease?” he asked, hesitatingly.