"Pamela wouldn't take the slightest notice of anything I might say,"
Van Teyl declared. "Besides, I should hate you to marry her."
"A little blunt, are you not, my young friend?" Fischer remarked amiably. "Still, to continue, there is also the matter of that document. I must confess that I exercised all my ingenuity to obtain possession of it on the steamer."
"You would!" Van Teyl muttered.
"Your sister, however," Fischer continued, "was wise enough to have it locked up in the purser's safe the moment she set foot upon the steamer. She gave me the slip when she got it back, and eluded me, somehow, on the quay. She will scarcely have had time to part with it yet, though. When she arrives here to-night, it will in all probability be in her possession."
"Well?" Van Teyl demanded. "You don't suggest that I should rob her of it, I suppose?"
"Not at all," Fischer replied. "On the other hand, you might very well induce her to give it up voluntarily, or at least to treat with me."
"You don't know Pamela," was Van Teyl's curt reply.
"I know her sufficiently," Fischer went on, leaning over the table, "to believe that she would sacrifice a great deal to save her brother from Sing Sing."
Van Teyl took the thrust badly. He started as though he had been stabbed, and his face became almost ghastly in its pallor. He tossed off a glass of wine hastily.
"Just what do you mean by that?" he asked thickly.