Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/289

 "You laugh?" she questioned. "You do not believe me?"

"Indeed, and I do so. In fact, it but dovetails with me own suspicions. What I've been trying to figure out, madame, is how ye come to know so much. Another thing—ye did not bring me here to warn me of this; I could have taken such a warning as well at Shepheard's. … Well, madame?"

"No." She turned away again to the lattice; he divined that she did not wish him to read her face. "No, not alone to tell you that. I brought you here, monsieur—to save you."

"I—faith, I'm infinitely obliged, madame. But I confess that I fail to follow ye."

"In all Cairo"—her earnestness carried conviction—"you could nowhere be safe to-night save here."

"I'm not so sure of that as ye seem to be," he said to himself. "However"—aloud—"'tis very kind of ye; but why do ye take such trouble for a vagabond that's naught to ye, madame?"

"Have I said—that?"

Her answer was quick. But O'Rourke nodded sagaciously at her white shoulders. He was beginning to glimpse an illuminating light.

"Ye did not," he conceded. "For that matter, madame, ye have not told me how 'tis ye that are so authoritatively informed concerning the O'Rourke."

His tone apprised her of the fact that the blindfold had been lifted from his eyes. No longer the man was walking in darkness—as far as concerned herself, at least.

"I," she told him, "am acquainted with certain parties who—who—"

"Who are acquainted with me?"