Read "The Gap in the Curtain" by John Buchan online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
"For mee (if there be such a thing as I) Fortune (if there be such a thing as shee) Spies that I beare so well her tyranny, That she thinks nothing else so fit for mee. " - JOHN DONNE
Tavanger's life was a little beyond my beat. Your busy city magnate does not dine out a great deal, and as a rule he fights shy of political circles. Before that Flambard Whitsuntide I had met him occasionally at public dinners, and once I had had to cross- examine him in a case in the Commercial Court, and a very tough proposition I found him. I was attracted by something solid and dignified in his air, and I thought his taciturnity agreeable; your loquacious financier is the dullest of God's creatures. During the early autumn I found myself occasionally wondering whether Tavanger had seen anything under Moe's spell, for he had had the look of a convinced disciple. I was certain that he would play up to whatever vision he had been vouchsafed, for your financier is as superstitious as a punter and will act boldly on hints which he never attempts to rationalise. Then, in the beginning of the Michaelmas term, fortune brought us together.