Page:Frank Packard - The White Moll.djvu/264

 "Oh!" She laughed almost hysterically in relief. "I thought so! You haven't got her yet. You're only going to get her—in another hour or so! You make me tired! It's always in 'another hour or so' with you—and it never comes off!"

Danglar scowled at her under the taunt.

"It'll come off this time!" he snarled in savage menace. "You hold that tongue of yours! Yes, it'll come off! And when it does"—a sweep of fury sent the red into his working face—"I'll keep the promise I made her once—that she'd wish she had never been born! D'ye hear, Bertha?"

"I hear," she said indifferently. "But would you mind telling me how you are going to do it? I might believe you then—perhaps!"

"Damn you, Bertha!" he exploded. "Sometimes I'd like to wring that pretty neck of yours; and sometimes I"—he moved suddenly toward her—"I would sell my soul for you, and"

She retreated from him coolly.

"Never mind about that! This isn't a love scene!" she purred caustically. "And as for the other, save it for the White Moll. What makes you think you've got her at last?"

"I don't think—I know." He stood gnawing at his lips, eying her uncertainly, half angrily, half hungrily. And then he shrugged his shoulders. "Listen!" he said. "I've got some one else, too! And I know now where the leak that's queered every one of our games and put the White Moll wise to every one of our plans beforehand has come from. I guess you'll believe me now, won't you? We've got that dude pal of hers fastened up tighter than the night he fastened me with his cursed handcuffs! Do you know who that same dude pal is?" He laughed in an ugly, immoderate way.