Evans went on, wholly ignoring her colleague's somewhat singular disclaimer,--
"Then if she didn't use it to unlock your drawer with--your private drawer--and to take liberties with everything that was inside it. I daresay if I hadn't come and caught her she'd have walked off with the lot. And then to have the face to brazen it out!"
To which Wilson, in a flame of fury,--
"Don't you dare to say I'd have taken a single thing, because I won't have it. I'm no more a thief than you are, nor perhaps half so much, and so I'll have you know. You're a great deal too fond of calling names, you are; but if you call me a thief I'll pay you for it. You see!"
Evans turned again to her adversary, eager for a continuance of the fray.
"If you weren't going to take them what did you go to the drawer for?"
"I tell you I went to the drawer to see if it was the key.
"Why didn't you bring the key to me?"
"I would have brought it, if you'd given me a chance."
"You would have brought it! Didn't I catch you--"