She led him into a sitting-room, which was fortunately empty.
"Well," she said, continuing to draw on her gloves, "what do you want,
Mr. Littleson?"
"You know very well what I want," he answered quickly. "I have my cheque-book in my pocket, and I am ready to pay over the hundred thousand dollars. I know that you have the paper. If you like to wait for ten minutes, you can have the money in dollars."
"How do you know that I have the paper?" she asked calmly.
"Your cousin, Miss Virginia, has been to our office," he answered. "She thought, naturally, that you had brought it straight to us. I don't know whether she seriously expected that we would give it up again, but that seemed to be the object of her visit. At any rate, we learnt that you had succeeded."
Stella was busy with the last finger of her glove.
"Yes!" she said, "I succeeded. It was a brutal action, and I shall never quite forgive myself for it, but I got the paper."
"Well?" he said.
"Well?" she answered calmly.
A horrible misgiving came over him.