There had been no movement by the stenographer for some time, and Brainard had almost forgotten her presence. Suddenly, while he was in the safe, he heard a slight sound outside, like the movement of a woman’s dress. He jumped to his feet. The stenographer, with one hand on the desk telephone, was about to take off the receiver.
“Put that down!” Brainard ordered, and added more gently, “What are you telephoning for?”
“Just going to call up a friend,” the woman replied pertly, and started to take the receiver off the hook again.
Brainard cleared the intervening space in a bound, and snatched the instrument from the woman’s hand.
“You’ll have to wait a while to talk to your friend!”
“What are you doing here, anyway?” she asked angrily.
“You can see—packing up some papers. You might give me a hand.”
“Say,” she replied without moving, “I don’t believe that yarn you told old Peters.”
“Oh, you don’t?”
“Not for one minute!”