"Congratulate me on being a rich woman! I got a check from an old, almost forgotten, patient to-day. A hundred dollars, all in one lump! It's a fortune in San Juan, isn't it?" Norton laughed with her. "I feel like spending it all in a breath," she ran on. "I went right away to Mr. Engle and had him cash it so that I could see what five twenty-dollar gold pieces looked like. And I chinked them and played with them like a child! Do you think I am growing greedy for gold in my old age? . . . You ought to see them piled up, though; five twenties. Isn't gold a pretty thing? I've a notion to go get them and show them to you; they're right on my table ..." She broke off suddenly, her hand on his arm. "Did you see some one out there at the corner of the house?" she asked quickly. "Do you think . . ." Then she laughed again and settled back in her chair. "Already thinking somebody is going to steal my gold! My five twenties. Just to punish myself I am going to leave them on my office table all night; do you suppose I'll be wondering all the time if somebody is crawling in at a window and taking them?" Five minutes later she said good night and left him. "I'll be up early in the morning," she said laughingly. "Just to make sure that my gold is there!" An hour later Virginia Page, sitting fully dressed in the darkness of her bedroom, got quietly to her feet and went to the door leading to her office. With wildly beating heart she stood listening, seeking to peer through the crack of the door she had left ajar. She had heard the faint, expected sound of some one moving cautiously. Now she heard it again, then the rustling of loose papers lying on her table, then the faint, golden chink of yellow-minted disks. As she suddenly scratched the match in her hand, drawing it along the wall, she threw the door open. The tiny flame, held high, retrieved the room from darkness into sufficient pale light. The man at her table whirled upon her, an exclamation caught in his throat, one hand going to his hip, the other closing tight upon what it held. She came in, her eyes steadily upon his, her face deathly pale. As the match fell from her fingers she went to the open window and drew down the shade. Then she lit a second match, set it to her lamp, and sank wearily into her chair. "Shall we thresh matters out, Mr. Norton?" she asked. CHAPTER XVIII DESIRE OUTWEIGHS DISCRETION Following Virginia's barely audible words there was a long silence. Her eyes, dark with the trouble in them, rested upon Norton's face and saw the frown go from his brows while slowly the red seeped into his bronzed cheeks. For the first time in her life she saw him staggered by the shock of surprise, held hesitant and uncertain. For a little there was never a movement of his rigid muscles; one hand rested upon the butt of his revolver, the other was closed upon the stack of gold pieces. When at last he found his tongue it was to accuse her.