"I trusted you with it, and you
behaved like a brute. You kept it. It has nothing to do with
you. You have no right to it."
"Let us understand one another, once and for all," he suggested.
"I will not even discuss the question of rightful or wrongful
possession. I have the packet, and I am going to keep it. You
cannot cajole it put of me, you cannot steal it from me.
To-morrow I shall take it to London and deliver it to my friend at
the Foreign Office. Nothing could induce me to change my mind."
She seemed suddenly to be caught up in the vortex of a new
emotion. All the bitterness passed from her expression. She fell
on her knees by his side, sought his hands, and lifted her face,
full of passionate entreaty, to his. Her eyes were dimmed with
tears, her voice piteous.
"Do not be so cruel, so hard," she begged. "I swear before Heaven
that there is no treason in those papers, that they are the one
necessary link in a great, humanitarian scheme. Be generous, Mr.
Orden. Julian! Give it back to me. It is mine. I swear--"
His hands gripped her shoulders. She was conscious that he was
looking past her, and that there was horror in his eyes. The
words died away on her lips. She, too, turned her head. The door
of the sitting room had been opened from outside. Lord Maltenby
was standing there in his dressing gown, his hand stretched out
behind him as though to keep some one from following him.
"Julian," he demanded sternly, "what is the meaning of this?"
For a moment Julian was speechless, bereft of words, or sense of
movement.
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