Page:Arthur Stringer--The House of Intrigue.djvu/160

148 the clash of unspoken question and answer, the final surrender to some mute argument which had to be faced. It was like a stage-wait, with the audience at the far end of that dimly-lighted room getting restless to understand the reason for it. But it ended in the snipe-nosed old man of law once more leaning solicitously in over his somewhat triumphant-eyed patient.

"What is it, my dear, you are asking of us?" he inquired, apparently with the forbearance of a long-suffering man being tried beyond his just deserts.

"Just about seven per cent. as a commission on the deal!" I whispered back. I said it quietly enough to carry to that little group about the bedside, but no farther. I could see old Enoch Bartlett's face working in the vague side-light. The expression of that face made me grateful for the pillar of Sheffield-plate that reposed on that bed so close beside me.

"So please add item six to that will," I whispered, in a slightly louder tone than before. For I was beginning to lose patience with that circle of dyed-in-the-wool hypocrites. And I intended to show them that their poor little half-wooled ewe-lamb wasn't the thing of meekness they had thought her.

"Now what is it, my dear, that you wish insert-