"I doubt it. How long will the job take, and how much notice will you need?"
"Two days, sir. No notice. Everything is ready."
Hilton, face somber, thought for minutes. "The more I think of it the less I like it. But it seems to be a forced put ... and Temple will blow sky high ... and have I got the guts to go it alone, even if she'd let me...." He shrugged himself out of the black mood. "I'll look her up and let you know, Larry."
HE looked her up and told her everything. Told her bluntly; starkly; drawing the full picture in jet black, with very little white.
"There it is, sweetheart. The works," he concluded. "We are not going to have ten years; we may not have ten months. So—if such a brain as that can be had, do we or do we not have to have it? I'm putting it squarely up to you."
Temple's face, which had been getting paler and paler, was now as nearly colorless as it could become; the sickly yellow of her skin's light tan unbacked by any flush of red blood.
Her whole body was tense and strained.
"There's a horrible snapper on that question.... Can't I do it? Or anybody else except you?"
"No. Anyway, whose job is it, sweetheart?"