“Figuratively and literally! Mentally, morally and physically! That’s how! I’ve stood all I can—I’ve waited long enough—too long—and now I’m going to play the game my own way! As I said, I played a trump card—I raised one pretty definite ruction just before we left. Now, that may do the business—and, it may not! If not, then desperate measures are necessary—and will be used!” “Good gracious, Mr. Appleby!” Genevieve piped up from her fur collar which nearly muffled her little face. “You sound positively murderous!” “Murder! Pooh, I’d kill Dan Wheeler in a minute, if that would help Sam! But I don’t want Wheeler dead—I want him alive—I want his help—his influence—yet, when he sits there looking like a stone wall, and about as easy to overthrow, I declare I _could_ kill him! But I don’t intend to. It’s far more likely he’d kill me!” “Why?” exclaimed Keefe. “Why should he? And—but you’re joking.” “Not at all. Wheeler isn’t of the murderer type, or I’d be taking my life in my hands to go into his house! He hates me with all the strength of a hard, bigoted, but strictly just nature. He thinks I was unjust in the matter of his pardon, he thinks I was contemptible, and false to our old-time friendship; and he would be honestly and truly glad if I were dead. But—thank heaven—he’s no murderer!” “Of course not!” cried Genevieve. “How you do talk! As if murder were an everyday performance! Why, people in our class don’t kill each other!” The placid assumption of equality of class with her employer was so consistently Miss Lane’s usual attitude, that it caused no mental comment from either of her hearers. Her services were so valuable that any such little idiosyncrasy was tolerated. “Of course we don’t—often,” agreed Appleby, “but I’d wager a good bit that if Dan Wheeler could bump me off without his conscience knowing it—off I’d go!” “I don’t know about that,” said Genevieve, musingly—“but I do believe that girl would do it!” “What?” cried Keefe. “Maida!” “Yes; she’s a lamb for looks, but she’s got a lion’s heart—if anybody ever had one! Talk about a tigress protecting her cubs; it would be a milk-and-water performance beside Maida Wheeler shielding her father—or fighting for him—yes, or killing somebody for him!” “Rubbish!” laughed Appleby. “Maida might be willing enough, in that lion heart of hers—but little girls don’t go around killing people.” “I know it, and I don’t expect her to. But I only say she’s capable of it.” “Goethe says—(Keefe spoke in his superior way)—‘We are all capable of crime, even the best of us.’” “I remember that phrase,” mused Appleby. “Is it Goethe’s? Well, I don’t say it’s literally true, for lots of people are too much of a jellyfish makeup to have such a capability. But I do believe there are lots of strong, forcible people, who are absolutely capable of crime—if the opportunity offers.”