Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction. Vol. 27, No. 2, September 24, 1927

“The fools are the wise men,” she countered. “They keep their consciences clean.”

He sat down opposite her. “You’re a quick little devil; upon my word. And cool, too. Not afraid, eh?”

“Not a bit — except — well, there is a reason why I don’t want to be handed over to the police. It’s a reason which nearly caused me to abandon to-night’s job and sacrifice a lot of time spent in preparation. That’s all.”

“Hm. Pathetic—” dryly. “By the way. How did you know the exact spot in which to cut the burglar alarm of the hall window? And how is it you came straight to this room? You see, I’ve been for a walk in the grounds. Affairs keep me up late. I have to think a lot.”

The former haggardness returned to his eyes. He was remembering that on the following night he had to render an account to William Smith.

“I found the window swinging gently open. I went straight to my room, got this gun, and came down here. Now there was no disturbance in the house. You’ve only just got the safe open. You can’t have been in the place more than twenty minutes, because I left the front door twenty-five minutes ago. So — how is it?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “I’m a good guesser,” she said. Her eyes were defiant on his.

“Have you bribed or pumped one of my servants?”

“I never bribe — and I’m no great shakes with a pump handle.”

He leaned forward across the table. “Listen — tell me the name of the fool or rogue who has allowed you to get acquainted with this house — and you can walk away. You’ve done no harm, so I can let you go.”

Again her shoulders lifted. “Take me to jail,” she said.

His lips curled. “Honor among thieves?”

“No. The imp of the perverse. Ever read that story, by the way? Creepy thing, isn’t it? I like Poe when I’m in some moods.”

He regarded her quizzically. “You’re a quaint little thing — slinging Poe and Shakespeare at me in the middle of a discussion on housebreaking.”

“Chacun a son gout,” she said. “You probably know quite a lot about them, and nothing about housebreaking. We must have a common ground for conversation, mustn’t we?”

“I suppose we must. So you won’t betray your pal, or your dupe. Well — perhaps it’s admirable, though hardly business. Are you armed?”

“Yes. I’ve got a seven-shot automatic pistol in a little pocket at the front of my gown. Do you want it?”

“I think it’s better. You can give it to me, can’t you?”

She looked at him. “You’ll allow me to take the gun from my pocket? Men have been shot from under the table before now.”

“I know. But I don’t think you’re the shooting sort. Anyhow” — with a little bitterness — “I’m not so sure that I’d mind being shot.”

She pushed the pistol across to him. “Thanks.” He sat back and studied her. She was, he thought, and she must realize it, in a desperately tight corner. Hitherto, on her own statement — which he believed, seeing that her name was entirely unfamiliar to him — she had escaped the clutches of that law she broke.

She did not know the soul-breaking ordeal of prison life. She was confident in her youth and her fresh beauty, her agility of body and wit. She bore herself with incredible courage, although the night was likely to see set on her forehead the brand of the outcast.

Before morning she would be with the lost. Within a few hours her record and her finger-prints, her photograph and her measurements would be at Scotland Yard. She would be marked down, pariah, hunted. At his entry through the door behind him her life had snapped.

She must know all this. She must! And yet she would not escape it by betraying her confederate; and she faced the prospect of it with an equanimity which, while astonishing him, gave birth to admiration within him.

A younger and less experienced man might have been tempted to set her free. A man with more humor in him might have talked lightly of a “a good smacking,” and have turned her out.

But to Lord Bordington as he sat and looked at her, an idea came.

It was somewhere about this time on the previous night that he had talked to William Smith, and in all the hours since, that formidable individual’s commonplace figure had loomed largely in his mental pictures. He saw Smith now, as unperturbed as this girl opposite him — but not more cool, nor more unperturbed.

He realized again, sickeningly, the man’s threat, his power, his personality. But opposite him was a personality, not threatening, but just as impressive. If Smith was a striking thing, so was this girl. If Smith, in his quiet, unimpassioned way, was a living, vital force, so was this girl.

Kitty, eying Bordington with some interest, saw his eyes light suddenly. His next words astonished her.

“I’d like to talk to you. I’ve got a proposition to put before you, which it might pay you to hear. Do you smoke?”

“A little — but I’d rather not, just now.” Her eyes were guarded.