"I refuse. I shall go, and you can do as you will,--
blunder on," scornfully, "with your nitroglycerin, your rags, and
drills and--and rouse the entire countryside, if you will."
"Ah, but--"
"Will you accept my aid?"
"On conditions, only," she stipulated. "Halvers?"
He shook his head.
"Half shares, or not at all!" She was firm.
"A partnership?"
This educed a moue of doubt, with: "I'm not worthy the honor."
"But," he promised rashly, "I can save you--oh, heaps of trouble
in other--ah--lays."
She shrugged helplessly. "If I must--then I do accept. We are
partners, Dan Anisty and I!"
He nodded mute satisfaction, brushed the tools out of his way, and
bent an attentive ear to the combination.
The girl swept across the room, and there followed a click
simultaneous with the total extinction of light.
Startled, "Why--?" he demanded.
"The risk," she replied. "We have been frightfully careless and
thoughtless."
Helplessly Maitland twirled the combination dial; without the
light he was wholly at a loss. But a breath later her skirts
rustled near him; the slide of the bull's-eye was jerked back, and
a circle of illumination thrown upon the lock. He bent his head
again, pretending to listen to the fall of the tumblers as the
dial was turned, but in point of fact covertly watching the
letters and figures upon it.
The room grew very silent, save for the faintly regular
respiration of the girl who bent near his shoulder.
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