Murgatroyd instantly sprang to his feet.
"You mean to bribe me!"
Miriam Challoner cowered before him. She had not put the matter to him in quite the way she had intended. She was desperately afraid that she had destroyed all hope of success by blurting it out like this. "Please don't be hard on me—condemn me," she begged as one before the judgment seat. "I know it's awful!"
For a full half minute Murgatroyd fastened his gaze on her face. Then he walked to the door, stepped inside the vault and satisfied himself that there was no one there, looked into every corner of the room and underneath the table; and when at last he was convinced that he had taken every precaution, he came back and stood directly in front of the woman and told her to repeat what she had said.
In fear and trembling she reiterated her words:—
"I will give you one hundred thousand dollars to set my husband free!"
"Mrs. Challoner," the prosecutor asked, falling into his habit of putting finger-tip to finger-tip, "how much money have you?"
"In all?"
Murgatroyd nodded.
"In just a minute...."