"We'll cut out the question of ownership. What's more to the point, is, what the devil you're doing in my house? If you wanted to see me, why didn't you wait for me to come to you? My wife is upstairs," he went on severely, "and my daughter all around the place. They probably both know you, even though they don't know.... You might have waited----" "I couldn't do that," she answered, faltering. "I--I had to see you, and I couldn't wait. Do you suppose I would have come here--to your home--if there hadn't been some urgency about it. I wrote; you did not answer." "The Tri-State kept me on the jump," he half apologised. "I had no time to read love letters----" "Love letters? Indeed!" she interjected, and then went on: "I called at the Trust Company office to see you, sent messages, called you up on the 'phone, but to no avail. I had to see you even at the risk of your displeasure. Besides, no one has seen me but you." Wilkinson started. "You've been here in this room all the time--what?" "Behind those curtains," she informed him, emphasising her words with a nod toward them. Wilkinson advanced on the woman as if he were about to strike her, for now he knew that she had been spying upon him, had been a witness to Flomerfelt's confidences, had listened to the colloquy between Leslie and himself; but, making a great effort, he checked his mad impulse, and, instead, endeavoured to make no point whatever of her presence there. He knew Madeline Braine's comprehension of business schemes was nil. To direct her attention to anything she had heard would be unwise. "You couldn't have chosen a better place," he told her genially. And then it was that suddenly something seemed to snap within his brain. The terrible excitement of the past few weeks was beginning to tell on him; a wild yearning to escape all further responsibility, to rove free, careless, reckless, took possession of him. The woman before him was lovely to look upon, he liked her, and why not chuck the whole game, so he termed it, take her away with him, anywhere, to South America, to the ends of the world? "Why not?" he exclaimed, touching her on the shoulder. The woman looked at him, surprised. "I say, Madeline," he went on, happily, "I've been so busy of late that I haven't seen as much of you as I would have liked. Besides, you were good enough to be out the last two times I looked you up. Do you know," he was close to her now, his hot breath upon her face, "I don't think I ever loved you quite as much as now. Suppose I take a rest from business, and we'll take a ten-days' trip in the _Marchioness_. We'll have a bully good time! Come, Madeline, say the word, and I'll do it." Madeline eluded his amorous embrace, and slipping to the side of the desk placed upon it a small black bag. "One of the things, Peter V.," she said quietly, "I came for, was to bring these back."