Drew raised his eyes to the ceiling. A faint smile brightened his olive skin and brought out the fullness of his cheeks.
“Five thousand dollars,” he said, without glancing at Loris.
She dipped the pen into the ink well, leaned her elbow on the leaf of the writing desk and hastily scratched a check with angular writing which had certainly been cultivated in a select boarding school. She turned, waved the check in the air, then rose and advanced toward the detective, who had not lowered his eyes.
“Thank you,” she said, holding out the oblong of tinted paper. “I want to thank you.”
Nichols stared at the detective. The soldier’s eyes were like bayonets beneath a parapet. He had thought the figure rather high. Loris had no one to advise her save himself and the presence of Drew had tied his tongue.
“I want to thank you,” repeated Loris.
Drew lowered his eyes and reached for the check. He glanced at it, started folding two edges, then smiled brightly as he crossed the room, picked up the mother-of-pearl penholder and dipped it into the ink.
“I’ll endorse it,” he said, flattening out the check with his palm. “I’ll endorse it so that it can be transferred.”
“To whom?” asked Loris.
“Why, to where it belongs. Do you think that I could take it? It’s too much in the first place. In the second place I’m going to do my full bit from now on. What do you say, if we endorse this over to the American Red Cross? It’ll buy beds and bandages and it’ll help out all around!”