Laponi smiled impudently.
“Well, don’t say I didn’t give you your choice, Miss Nichols. It is your decision to have no share in the spoils?”
“It is.”
Laponi’s face darkened slightly. “As you wish, Miss Nichols. But let me give you a little warning. Keep your nose out of my affairs or it will be the worse for you!”
He turned and walked from the room. A minute later Penny saw him leave the house by the side door.
“If he thinks he can frighten me with a threat he has another guess coming!” she thought indignantly. “For two cents I’d call in the police.”
Upon second consideration she decided that such a move would not be wise. After all she had no real evidence against Laponi. While she was convinced in her own mind that his motives were dishonest the police might take a more conservative attitude. Then too, she would be forced to offer a satisfactory explanation for her own presence in the house.
“Laponi is after something more valuable than a will,” Penny mused as she stood at the window watching his car vanish down the driveway.
Her eye wandered to the oil painting on the wall. She felt certain that the safe which was screened beneath it guarded Mr. Winters’ collection of ivory. And from the expression of Laponi’s face when she had mentioned her belief, she was sure that he shared the same conviction.
“He practically admitted he was involved in some scheme to defraud Rosanna,” she thought. “I can’t help feeling he’s a crook even if he is a relative of Mr. Winters. I wish I dared search his room for evidence!”