Page:Arthur Stringer - The Hand of Peril.djvu/333

 understand that? And from this evening on, Herr Watchel, alias Gustav Wimpffen, alias Adolph Keudell, you're going to have something more than a lonely girl to fight against!"

Watchel, with an assumption of leisure, proceeded to remove his immaculate gloves.

"And what must I fight against?" he inquired with a lift of the eyebrows.

"Against me!" barked out Kestner as he crossed the room. Then he swung about to Maura Lambert again. "Have you got a key for this desk?"

"Yes," she answered.

"Where'd you get it?"

"I had a duplicate made after losing the first one, two days ago."

"And who got the first one?"

"I don't know."

"But I do. And this man Watchel does. Open the desk, please."

Kestner strode to the door and closed it, standing with his back to the heavy panels. The girl crossed to the teakwood desk and with shaking fingers fitted a key to the lock. Then she opened the lid.

Watchel took three steps forward, as though to follow her. Suddenly he stopped and turned about, facing Kestner.

"Do you know what this woman is?" he contemptuously demanded.

"Yes, I know what she is," cried back Kestner, and his voice was shaking. Seven months of banked fires, of repressed human passion, blazed out from him as he spoke. "And I know what you are, Wimpffen,