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322 And again she laughed at him, fearless in her anger and scorn.

"Am I a fool?" she cried passionately. "Fool I have been, but not to the uttermost! Do I hear nothing of what goes forward, and hearing do I not think and wonder? Do I not know now that it was your money which financed that hideous house in Summit City? That it was you and not Bill Steele who put up those insulting signs? That it was Bill Steele who, before all men and in white rage, tore down your handiwork in Boom Town? That it has been for your own ends all along that you have urged me on to strife with him? That it was you tonight who dared have me brought here that it might be you who would come bravely to the rescue?"

"You are mistaken," he said sharply.

"I am not mistaken," she flared out at him. "Had Bill Steele wanted to carry me away tonight he would have done it alone, Bill Steele's way, a man's way! No, Mr. Embry, I am not mistaken. You have played your game, played it to the desperate end and have lost."

He stood in silence, his eyes keen and hard and penetrating. Then he shrugged.

"Have it your own way," he said coolly, and now more than ever did she marvel at the man's mastery of himself. "If you like, I have played a risky game because I have had to do it. And lost? Not yet, if you please. I have not lost and, by God, I am not going to lose. … We need not waste time in idle talk, need we? When a man plays a desperate game it is