Page:Jackson Gregory--joyous trouble maker.djvu/330

314 Things one has to pay for. Is that what you thought?"

"Go on," he said curtly. "How much did Embry give you?"

Now she was studying him shrewdly.

"If I said ten thousand dollars?"

"I'd make it another twenty thousand!"

"If I said … let me see. Twenty-five thousand?"

"I'd make it fifty thousand! If you can show me the way to find her."

A bright flush was in her cheeks; she came to him and laid a hand which was suddenly unsteady on his arm.

"Write me a check for fifty thousand dollars," she whispered. "Then have a car ready to take me away immediately. Before Embry knows. And I will tell you where he has taken her. And I'll be glad, glad that you have beat Joe Embry! He has planned to compromise her so that she will have to marry him … oh, he is fool enough to think that she'd do it! But she wouldn't. We know that, don't we, Mr. Steele?"

"Do we?" he asked coldly.

"We do! And, to give you full value for your check, my big foolish friend, let me whisper something into your ear: Beatrice is head over heels in love with you right now! Now, order a car for me and I'll get dressed and meet you at the back door. There'll be no trumpets blaring when I take my departure."

Gathering up her kimono about her she ran out of the room, disappearing through a door opposite the one through which they had entered.