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CHAPTER XII

TIDINGS FROM THE CAPE

Wrayson paused for a moment in his work to answer the telephone which stood upon his table.

"What is it?" he asked sharply.

His manager spoke to him from the offices below.

"Sorry to disturb you, sir, but there is a young man here who won't go away without seeing you. His name is Barnes, and he says that he has just arrived from South Africa."

It was a busy morning with Wrayson, for in an hour or so the paper went to press, but he did not hesitate for a moment.

"I will see him," he declared. "Bring him up yourself."

Wrayson laid down the telephone. Morris Barnes had come from South Africa. It was a common name enough, and yet, from the first, he was sure that this was some relative. What was the object of his visit? The ideas chased one another through his brain. Was he, too, an avenger?

There was a knock at the door, and the clerk from downstairs ushered in his visitor. Wrayson could scarcely repress a start. It was a younger edition of Morris Barnes who stood there, with an ingratiating smile upon his pale face, a trifle more Semitic in appearance, perhaps, but in other respects the likeness