THE UNKNOWN MR. KENT
the financier, should leave him, Mr. Kent, undisturbed. He was rebellious.
"John Rhodes," said he to himself, "has bossed me around and run me here and there, like a small boy hopping a cat over hurdles in the cellar, until I'm sick and tired of it. He's paid me well, and I'm fairly well off; but I've sure earned every cent I ever got out of him. He's gone on a long vacation. So shall I. And if John Rhodes doesn't like it he can go to "; but at that point of his meditations caution, or perhaps some of his loyalty to Rhodes, overcame his disregard of that amiable employer under whom he had prospered, and caused him to take the precaution of leaving word with sundry bankers of New York, London, Paris, Berlin and Vienna where Rhodes could find him if desiring his services. And, so strong is the habit of discipline and obedience, on second thought he arranged that mails might be forwarded enclosed in protective envelopes, keeping him informed concerning certain financial transactions entrusted to him by Mr. Rhodes. From all of which it might be conjectured that, despite his mutinous disposition, he cautiously realised that, without the fat commissions afforded by John Rhodes, Richard Kent might shrivel as thin as a living skeleton in a freak museum, and be compelled to seek another patron endowed with purse, power, and authority.
