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LORD RAYBURN turned the letter over in his hand, and a smile crept into those piercing eyes of his, for the great scientist permitted himself to be pleased.

"Now, this is a remarkable thing, Hayter," he said to his chief assistant. "Here is actually a letter from my great antagonist, Miguel del Viantes. He proposes to come and see me. I take it that this is an admission that all these years he has been attacking me unjustly. "

George Hayter smiled behind his hand. He was well acquainted with the jealousies and bitter bickerings of scientists the world over, and there was not anywhere a scientist who was not aware of the deadly rivalry between Lord Rayburn and the eminent Spaniard. The fact that they had never met, and that they did not even know one another by sight, made little difference. Therefore Hayter listened discreetly.

"He wants to come and see me," the great man went on. "He says he is going to South America on an experimental mission, of which, of course, he says nothing, but he hints that possibly he may not return. It is his way of holding out the olive branch, I suppose. Anyway, he wants to see me, and, unless I wire him to the contrary, he will motor down here this afternoon. As the visit is entirely private—you will understand why he doesn't want people to know he has been here—you had better arrange for him to leave his car in the lane at the end of the shrubbery, and come here across the garden, through the conservatory. As he drives his own car, this should be easily managed. Then you can bring him here, and leave us alone together.

"Of course," Hayter murmured. "Does Del Viantes say what he is coming for?"

"Well, yes. He is deeply interested in those freezing experiments of mine. I gather that he particularly wants to have a look at the diamond that we are experimenting upon. But he does not say any more than that. "

Hayter gave the desired assurance and vanished, leaving the great scientist to his own not unpleasant thoughts. This business was, in a way, the crowning glory of his career. It was soothing to his vanity to know that the great rival whom he had never seen was voluntarily seeking his advice—the advice of the man whom he had been attacking in the scientific press for years. The mere fact that the Spaniard was coming down to Tulham Place secretly made little or no difference.

So the pleased smile was still on Rayburn's face as he turned his back upon the laboratory and walked into the conservatory beyond. Both these buildings jutted out from the side of the house on to a sloping bank which led to a famous rose-garden, and the foundation consisted of a series of tanks and vaults, specially constructed, and something like a huge aquarium, in which Rayburn's freezing experiments were constantly going on. For Rayburn was a rich man, the head of an old family, and, apart from the estate, which would go elsewhere when he died, had a small fortune of his own, which he spent on his research work. And this small fortune would some day pass to his confidential assistant, George Hayter.