"Our inventions." Maclin showed no nervous dread. "These inventions, big as they are, old man, are devilish simple. That's why we have to lie low. Any really keen chap with the right slant could steal them from under our noses. That's why I like to get foreigners in here--these Dutchies don't smell around. Give them work to do, and they do it and ask no questions; the others snoop. Now this Northrup is here for a purpose." "You know that for a fact, Maclin?" "Sure, I know it." Maclin was a man who believed in holding all the cards and discarding at his leisure; he always played a slow game. "I know his kind, but I'm going to let him hang himself. Now see here, Rivers, you better take me into your confidence--I may be able to fix you up. What's wrong between you and your wife?" This plunge sent Larry to the wall. When a slow man does make a drive, he does deadly work. "Well, then"--Larry looked sullen--"I've left the house and mean to stay out until Mary-Clare comes to her senses!" "All right, old man. I rather smelled this out. I only wanted to make sure. It's this Northrup, eh? Now, Rivers, I could send you off on a trip but it would be the same old story. I hate to kick you when you're down, but I will say this, your wife doesn't look like one mourning without hope when you're away, and with this Northrup chap on the spot, needing entertainment while he works his game, I'm thinking you better stay right where you are! You can, maybe, untie the knot, old chap. Give her and this Northrup all the chance they want, and if you leave 'em alone, I guess the Forest will smoke 'em out." Maclin came nearer to being jubilant than Rivers had ever seen him. The sight was heartening, but still something in Larry tempered his enthusiasm. He had been able, in the past, to exclude Mary-Clare from the inner sanctuary of Maclin's private ideals, and he hated now to betray her into his clutches. Maclin was devilishly keen under that slow, sluggish manner of his and he hastened, now, to say: "Don't get a wrong slant on me, old man. I'm only aiming for the good of us all, not the undoing. I want to show this fellow Northrup up to your wife as well as to others. Then she'll know her friends from her foes. Naturally a woman feels flattered by attentions from a man like this stranger, but if she sees how he's taken the Heathcotes in and how he's used her while he was boring underground, she'll flare up and know the meaning of real friends. Some women have to be _shown_!" By this time Larry suspected that much had gone on during his absence that Maclin had not confided to him. He was thoroughly aroused.