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78. It's not good manners to threaten a lady."

"It's even more impolite to threaten her by word of mouth," said I, "but that's what I am here for. That was a low-down trick of yours, Léontine. I never would have believed it of you. What made you do it?"

Her eyes danced. "There were two reasons," said she. "First, I wanted to get you back to your own again. The other was because I hate that lump of a girl you are always with. The last time we met it was all that I could do to keep from slashing her across the face with my crop. You don't really care for her, do you, Frank? Such a lump of a flaxen-headed doll."

"I don't care for her at all," I answered. "I have been teaching her to drive because I was ordered to. Those reasons are not enough to excuse your rounding on a pal, my dear." "I am not excusing myself—and you are no longer a pal. You refused to be a pal."

There's no use going into that," said I, "where are those pearls?"

She gave me a teasing look.

"Don't you wish you knew?" said she.

"I do know," I answered. "They are here. Hand them over, Léontine. Your plot has failed. My friends believe in me as much as ever, but they think that my old pals have played it on me mighty low. So do I. Why don't you tell the truth and say that you wanted the money and knew that you ran no risk because, owing to what they did for me, the hands of the victims were tied?"

Léontine's eyes blazed. "Wanted the money!"