"And you believed that? Good Lord!" He contrived to inflect into his voice just the right mixture of amusement and astonishment at her credulity. "If I were that kind of dirty skunk, why should I try to shelter behind someone else? Did I ever strike you, Adèle, as a man who would be afraid of coming out into the open in a case like that?" "Do you mean that he invented that story?" "Invented it. That's one of the oldest tricks of the police detective. He wanted to embitter you against me. I give you my word of honour, Adèle. You'll believe me, won't you?" "Do you know it never struck me in that way," she said reflectively. She thrust out a hand towards him which he affected not to see. "Of course I believe you, Larry." "I am glad of that." He gave a convincing sigh of relief. "Now, Adèle, I want you to help me. It's about Penelope Noelson." "You've not fallen in love with her, have you?" she asked with a little laugh. "By the way, what is she doing here?" He looked at her thoughtfully before replying. "Couldn't you guess that?" he said steadily. "She is here because I intend to marry her." Adèle Gertstein drew herself bolt upright. "Marry her," she repeated harshly. "You say she is going to marry you?" "The same thing. I am going to marry her." Her face betrayed the complexities of emotions that were in her mind. A quarter of an hour before she would have dismissed from her mind as an absurdity the idea that she was still in love with Larry Hughes. But now her vanity was touched at his airy assumption that she would calmly accept the defection of the man she had once made a conquest. Had she lost all her attraction? She burst into laughter--ironical bitter laughter. "That grey mouse," she said. "You want to marry her! It is comic." "I wouldn't have believed it possible," he said gravely. "I believe you are doing me the honour to be jealous." "Of that doll," she exclaimed. "Me jealous of Penelope Noelson. It struck me as funny, but otherwise it is a matter of complete indifference to me." Larry tried to follow the trend of her mind. He could not determine whether she was moved by pique, or whether she was actually a jealous woman. None knew better than he how difficult it was to probe the fluky and irresponsible motives which swayed her with every passing mood. If he was to enlist her for his purposes he must by some means or other overcome this unexpected antagonism. He laughed easily. "I was joking, of course, Adèle. If you were a free woman--but it is no good thinking about that. To tell you the truth, Adèle, I am forced to this. Your safety as well as mine depends on closing the mouth of this girl. There are two ways. The one is marriage." She thrust forward a strained face. "And the other?"