So astonished and stunned had she been by the changes and the sudden suspicions that arose that Mary at first had stood startled and silent, and Jepson had raised his voice. At this he remembered that she had gone East for an operation to help restore her hearing and, seeing her now so unresponsive, he immediately assumed the worst. So he shouted his explanations and Mary, flushing, informed him that she could hear very well.
"Oh, I beg your pardon," he apologized abjectly; but she noticed that he kept on shouting. And then in a flash of sudden resentment she bit her lips and let him shout. If he still wished to think that she was deaf as a post she would not correct him again. Perhaps if her suspicions should prove to be justified it would help her to discover his plans.
In her room that evening Mary brought from her trunk the ear-'phone she had cast aside. She had packed it away with a sigh of relief and yet a lingering fear for the future, and already she was putting it on. At the back of the transmitter there was a mechanical device which regulated the intensity of the sound. When she settled the clasp across her head and hung the 'phone over her ear she set it at normal and then advanced the dial until she could hear the faintest noise. The roar of the lobby, drifting in through the transom, became separated into its various sounds. She could hear men talking and outbursts of laughter and the scrape of moving chairs. The murmur of conversation in the adjoining room became a spat between husband and wife and, ashamed of her eavesdropping, she put down the instrument and looked about, half afraid.
As the doctor through his stethoscope can hear the inrush of air as it is drawn into the patient's lungs, or the surge of blood as it is pumped through the heart with every telltale gurgle of the valves; so with that powerful instrument she could hear through walls and know what was being said. It was a wonderful advantage to have over these men if she discovered that there was treachery afoot and the following morning, to test it out, she wore her 'phone to the office.
"Mr. Jepson," she said as he rose nervously to meet her, "I'd like to bring my books down to date. Of course it is mostly a matter of form, or I couldn't have been gone for so long, but I want to look over the records of the office and make out my annual report."
"Why, certainly," responded Jepson, still speaking very clearly, and assuming his most placating smile, "I'd be glad to have you check up. With Mr. Jones away I've been so pressed by work I hardly know where we are. Just make yourself at home and anything I can do for you, please feel free to let me know."
She thanked him politely and then, as she ran through the files, she absently removed her ear-'phone.
"Just hold out that report of the mining experts," she heard Jepson remark to his clerk; and in an instant her suspicions were confirmed. He had had experts at work, making a report on their property, but he wished to withhold it from her. That report was doubtless for Whitney H. Stoddard, the only man that Jepson really served, the man who actually controlled their mine. But she worked on unheeding and presently, from across the room, she heard him speak again. His voice was low, but the painful operations, the tedious treatments she had endured, had sharpened her hearing until she caught every word except the mumbled assent of the clerk.
"And tell Mr. Lockhart I'll arrange about that rebate. The check will go directly to him."
He went on then with some hurried directions about the different accounts to be changed and then, without troubling to shout at her again, he turned and slipped away. She had found him out, then, the very first day—Mr. Jepson had an understanding with L. W.! She retired to her room to think it over and then went systematically to work on the books, but these seemed scrupulously correct. The influence of Stoddard, that apostle of thoroughness, was apparent throughout the office; for Jepson well knew that the day was coming when he must render an account to his master. The books were correct, yet she could hardly believe the marvellous production they recorded. Her share alone—a poor one per cent. of all that enormous profit—would keep her in comfort for the rest of her life; she need never work again.