Under Cover Part 33

"And you think I don't now?" he returned.

"I'm quite sure you don't," she told him.

"Why do you say that?" Denby inquired.

"There are lots of things," she answered. "One is that when I asked you why you were here in America, you put me off with some playful excuse about being just an idler." She looked at him with a vivacious air.

"Now didn't you really come over on an important mission?"

Poor Denby, who had been telling himself that Monty's suspicions were without justification, and that this girl's good faith could not be doubted even if several circ.u.mstances were beyond his power to explain, groaned inwardly. Here she was, trying, he felt certain, to gain his confidence to satisfy the men who were even now investing the house.

But he was far from giving in yet. How could she, one of Vernon Cartwright's daughters, reared in an atmosphere wholly different from this sordid business, be engaged in trying to betray him?

"Well," he said, "suppose I did come over on something more than pleasure, what do you want to know concerning it? And why do you want to know?"

"Shall we say feminine curiosity?" she returned.

He shook his head. "I think not. There must be something more vital than a mere whim."

"Perhaps there is," she conceded, leaning forward, "I want us to be friends, really good friends; I regard it as a test of friendship. Why won't you tell me?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "Shall we say man's intuition? Oh, I know it's not supposed to be as good as a woman's, but sometimes it's much more accurate."

"So you can't trust me?" she said, steadily trying to read his thoughts.

"Can I?" he asked, gazing back at her just as steadily.

"Don't you think you can?" she fenced adroitly.

"If you do," he said meaningly.

"But aren't we friends," she asked him, "pledged that night under the moon in the Bois? You see I, too, have memories of Paris."

"Then you put it," he said quietly, "to a test of friendship."

"Yes," she answered readily.

He thought for a moment. Well, here was the opportunity to find out whether Monty was right or whether the woman he cared for was merely a spy set upon him, a woman whose kindnesses and smiles were part of her training.

"Very well," he said, "then so do I. You are right. I did not come to America idly--I came to smuggle a necklace of pearls through the Customs. I did it to-day."

The girl rose from her seat by the little table where she had sat facing him and looked at him, all the brightness gone from her face.

"You didn't, you didn't!"

"I did," he a.s.sured her.

She turned her face away from him. "Oh, I'm sorry," she wailed. "I'm sorry."

Denby looked at her keenly. He was puzzled at the manner in which she took it.

"But I fooled 'em," he boasted.

She looked about her nervously as though she feared Taylor might have listened to his frank admission and be ready to spring upon them.

"You can't tell that," she said in a lower-keyed voice. "How can you be sure they didn't suspect?"

"Because I'm comfortably settled here, and there are no detectives after me. And if there were," he confided in her triumphantly, "they'd never suspect I carry the necklace in my tobacco-pouch."

"But your pouch was empty," she cried.

"How do you know that?" he demanded quickly.

"I was here when Lambart spilt it," she explained hastily. "There it is on the mantel, I meant to have given it to you."

"I don't need it," he said, taking one similar in shape and color from his pocket.

"Two pouches!" she cried aghast. "Two?"

"An unnecessary precaution," he said carelessly, "one would have done; as it is they haven't suspected me a bit."

"You can't be certain of that," she insisted. "If they found out they'd put you in prison."

"And would you care?" he demanded.

"Why, of course I would," she responded. "Aren't we friends?"

He had that same steady look in his eyes as he asked: "Are we?"

It was a gaze she could not bring herself to meet. a.s.suredly, she groaned, she was not of the stuff from which the successful adventuress was made.

"Of course," she murmured in reply. "But what are you going to do?"

"I've made my plans," he told her. "I've been very careful. I've given my confidence to two people only, both of whom I trust absolutely--Monty Vaughan and"--he looked keenly at her,--"and you. I shan't be caught. I won't give in, and I'll stop at nothing, no matter what it costs, or whom it hurts. I've got to win."

It seemed to him she made an e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n of distress. "What is it?" he cried.

"Nothing much," she said nervously, "it's the heat, I suppose. That's why I wouldn't dance, you know. Won't you take me into the garden and we'll look at the moon--it's the same moon," she said, with a desperate air of trying to conceal from him her agitation, "that shines in Paris.

It's gorgeous," she added, looking across the room where no moon was.

"Surely," he said. "It is rather stuffy indoors on a night like this."

He moved leisurely over to the French windows. But she called him back.

She was not yet keyed up to this supreme act of treachery.

"No, no," she called again, "don't let's go, after all."

"Why not?" he demanded, bewildered at her fitful mood.