"Yes, I may as well have it. And now, Mr. Calhoun, will you go, please, or do you intend to turn me over to the police?"
"Vicky!" I cried, "how can you say such a thing? Of course I'll go, if you bid me. But let me wait a minute. You know you wrote to Ruth Schuyler—"
"Ruth? Is that one of the old sisters?"
"No. Ruth is the widow."
"Oh, yes, I wrote to her. I didn't know her first name. I wrote because I thought it was she who is making the desperate search for me, and I hoped I could influence her to stop it. That's all. I have no interest in Randolph Schuyler's widow, except as she affects my future, but can you do anything by working in the other direction? I mean can you dissuade Fleming Stone from coming, by asking him not to? You can bribe him perhaps—I have money—"
"Oh, I doubt if I could do anything like that. But I'll try, I'll try every way I can, and, if I succeed—how shall I let you know?"
"Oh, I'll know. If he takes up the matter, it will probably get into the papers, and if I see nothing of it, I'll conclude you succeeded."
"But I—I want to see you again, Vicky—"
"Oh, no, you don't. Why, you don't know this minute but what I stabbed that man, and—"
"You didn't, Vicky—tell me you didn't!"