"Just to make
sure that my gold is there!"
An hour later Virginia Page, sitting fully dressed in the darkness of
her bedroom, got quietly to her feet and went to the door leading to
her office. With wildly beating heart she stood listening, seeking to
peer through the crack of the door she had left ajar. She had heard
the faint, expected sound of some one moving cautiously.
Now she heard it again, then the rustling of loose papers lying on her
table, then the faint, golden chink of yellow-minted disks. As she
suddenly scratched the match in her hand, drawing it along the wall,
she threw the door open. The tiny flame, held high, retrieved the room
from darkness into sufficient pale light. The man at her table whirled
upon her, an exclamation caught in his throat, one hand going to his
hip, the other closing tight upon what it held.
She came in, her eyes steadily upon his, her face deathly pale. As the
match fell from her fingers she went to the open window and drew down
the shade. Then she lit a second match, set it to her lamp, and sank
wearily into her chair.
"Shall we thresh matters out, Mr. Norton?" she asked.
CHAPTER XVIII
DESIRE OUTWEIGHS DISCRETION
Following Virginia's barely audible words there was a long silence.
Her eyes, dark with the trouble in them, rested upon Norton's face and
saw the frown go from his brows while slowly the red seeped into his
bronzed cheeks.
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