Page:Arthur Stringer--The House of Intrigue.djvu/322

302 one isn't, and you two high-brow Robin Hoods would've found it out, if you'd made one move to stop that man!"

It was a woman's voice, and the owner of that voice stepped in through the inner door opposite the hall at the same moment that I swung about and stared at her. It wasn't the revolver in this interloper's hand that made me gape at her with such stupid and empty eyes. It was the discovery that the woman was Copperhead Kate herself.

"Stop her!" was my foolish and frantic cry to Wendy Washburn as that woman with the snaky green eyes and the revolver in her hand strode insolently across the room to the other door.

"Try it!" challenged Copperhead Kate. "Try it—and the next clothes you put on won't come from me; they'll come from an undertaker!"

"Stop her!" I repeated in a gurgle as she passed out into the hall.

"What's the use?" quietly inquired my Hero- Man, "Since they insist on traveling together, why not humor their whim?"

"But don't you see what this means?" I somewhat shrilly and somewhat desperately demanded.

"It means that their journey can't possibly be as long as they anticipate," was Wendy Washburn's