Page:Glimpses of the Moon (Wharton 1922).djvu/113

Rh in the same dead-level tone, "exactly for what services we've both been so handsomely paid?"

"The pearl is beautiful," Susy murmured, to gain time, while her head spun round with unimaginable terrors.

"So are your sapphires; though, on closer examination, my services would appear to have been valued rather higher than yours. Would you be kind enough to tell me just what they were?"

Susy threw her head back and looked at him. "What on earth are you talking about, Nick! Why shouldn't Ellie have given us these things? Do you forget that it's like our giving her a pen-wiper or a button-hook? What is it you are trying to suggest?"

It had cost her a considerable effort to hold his eyes while she put the questions. Something had happened between him and Ellie, that was evident—one of those hideous unforeseeable blunders that may cause one's cleverest plans to crumble at a stroke; and again Susy shuddered at the frailty of her bliss. But her old training stood her in good stead. There had been more than one moment in her past when everything—somebody else's everything—had depended on her keeping a cool head and a clear glance. It would have been a wonder if now, when she felt her own everything at stake, she had not been able to put up as good a defence.

"What is it?" she repeated impatiently, as Lansing continued to remain silent.