"I think you must be a little mad!" Betty exclaimed. "My employer is a most charming and sympathetic person, the salary is high and the work very congenial.—But I don't know why I should trouble to defend my occupation to you, Mr. Ross. The little I know of you would not predispose me in your favor, and your wild assertions are ridiculous!"
"I cannot explain. Oh, won't you understand that my hands are tied, and I can only warn you of your danger? Please try to trust me, and believe that I am trying to protect you." In his eagerness he laid his hand upon her arm, but she shook it off coldly.
"You cannot be in earnest! I am a secretary and companion to a person whose reputation is unassailable. Surely you can tell me in what way am I being used as a tool?"
"The letters you write, the commissions you execute for her! Are the letters always intelligible to you? Do you know the real purpose of the errands upon which you are sent and what lies behind them?"
"Mr. Ross, your questions would be impertinent if they could be taken seriously. Mrs. Atterbury's correspondence is the usual one of a woman with large financial interests and a host of friends." Betty spoke hastily, her calmly disdainful attitude giving place to half-suppressed eagerness. "Every letter passes through my hands and I may say that her private affairs are an open book. Her charities are innumerable and her friends come to her with all their troubles, sure of help and comfort. The errands I attend to for her are such as anyone who disliked shopping would relegate to another. Really, you have been grossly misinformed; I am in no trap, I can assure you."
Herbert Ross gazed at her flushed face with eyes that had narrowed swiftly. Her change of manner was too palpable to be spontaneous, and it had come only when he had betrayed a knowledge of her activities. She might be a tool indeed but a willing one, closing her eyes to what she did not wish to see. Although his whole nature rebelled against the thought, a fertile seed of doubt was sown.
"It can't be!" He seemed to muse aloud. "You are inexperienced, trusting, blind! You believe what you are told by this woman, and completely under her influence, but you must open your eyes to the truth. Surely the thought must have come to you at times that everything was not well; have you never had a misgiving?"
She lifted her eyes to his in a bland, wondering stare.
"Misgiving of what? If we are to continue this conversation, Mr. Ross, you really must not talk in riddles. What could be wrong?"
His detective instinct was uppermost now and he realized that instead of quizzing her, he himself was being shrewdly drawn out. Was she trying to discover how much he really knew that she might the better arm herself against him? The seed had not taken firm root as yet, however, and in a swift revulsion of feeling he inwardly cursed his momentary suspicion. Her eyes were as clear and steady as the sun! Surely they could mask no scheming, no subterfuge. Yet if McCormick had spoken truly, the most innocent and unsophisticated mind must have found food for puzzled thought in that house of mystery.