"No, wait a minute," she interposed. "We are not quite ready to adjourn yet. There remains a little matter of compensation—your compensation—to be considered. You are still on the company's payrolls?"
"In a way, yes; as its legal representative on the ground."
"That won't do. If you carry this thing through successfully it must be on your own account, and not as the company's paid servant. You must resign and make terms with Boston beforehand; and that, too, without telling Boston what you propose to do."
He haggled a little at that.
"The company is entitled to my services," he asserted.
"It is entitled to what it pays for—your legal services. But this is entirely different. You will be acting upon your own initiative, and you'll have to spend money like water at your own risk. You must be free to deal with Boston as an outsider."
"But I have no money to spend," he objected.
Again the brown eyes grew luminous; and again she said:
"What would you do without me? Happily, my information came early enough to enable me to get a letter to Mr. Ormsby. He answered promptly by wire this morning. Here is his telegram."
She had been winding a tightly folded slip of paper around her fingers, and she smoothed it out and gave it to him. He held it in a patch of the electric light between the dancing leaf shadows and read: