you up and gagging you. That’s the alternative – and you won’t like it, I can tell you! I can be very rough if I choose. So drink this down like a good girl, and you’ll be none the worse for it.’
In her heart of hearts Tuppence believed her. The arguments she had adduced rang true. It was a simple and effective method of getting her out of the way for the time being. Nevertheless, the girl did not take kindly to the idea of being tamely put to sleep without as much as one bid for freedom. She felt that once Mrs Vandemeyer gave them the slip, the last hope of finding Tommy would be gone.
Tuppence was quick in her mental processes. All these reflections passed through her mind in a flash, and she saw where a chance, a very problematic chance, lay, and she determined to risk all in one supreme effort.
Accordingly, she lurched suddenly off the bed and fell on her knees before Mrs Vandemeyer, clutching her skirts frantically.
‘I don’t believe it,’ she moaned. ‘It’s poison – I know it’s poison. Oh, don’t make me drink it’ – her voice rose to a shriek – ‘don’t make me drink it!’
Mrs Vandemeyer, glass in hand, looked down with a curling lip at this sudden collapse.
‘Get up, you little idiot! Don’t go on drivelling there. How you ever had the nerve to play your part as you did I can’t think.’ She stamped her foot. ‘Get up, I say.’
But Tuppence continued to cling and sob, interjecting her sobs with incoherent appeals for mercy. Every minute gained was to the good. Moreover, as she grovelled, she moved imperceptibly nearer to her objective.
Mrs Vandemeyer gave a sharp impatient exclamation, and jerked the girl to her knees.
‘Drink it at once!’ Imperiously she pressed the glass to the girl’s lips.
Tuppence gave one last despairing moan.
‘You swear it won’t hurt me?’ she temporized.
‘Of course it won’t hurt you. Don’t be a fool.’
‘Will you swear it?’
‘Yes, yes,’ said the other impatiently. ‘I swear it.’
Tuppence raised a trembling left hand to the glass.
‘Very well.’ Her mouth opened meekly.
Mrs Vandemeyer gave a sigh of relief, off her guard for the moment. Then, quick as a flash, Tuppence jerked the glass upward as hard as she could. The fluid in it splashed into Mrs Vandemeyer’s face, and during her momentary gasp, Tuppence’s right hand shot out and grasped the revolver where it lay on the edge of the wash-stand. The next moment she had sprung back a pace, and the revolver pointed straight at Mrs Vandemeyer’s heart, with no unsteadiness in the hand that held it.
In the moment of victory, Tuppence betrayed a somewhat unsportsman-like triumph.
‘Now who’s on top and who’s underneath?’ she crowed.
The other’s face was convulsed with rage. For a minute Tuppence thought she was going to spring upon her, which would have placed the girl in an unpleasant dilemma, since she meant to draw the line at actually letting off the revolver. However, with an effort, Mrs Vandemeyer controlled herself, and at last a slow evil smile crept over her face.
‘Not a fool then, after all! You did that well, girl. But you shall pay for it – oh, yes, you shall pay for it! I have a long memory!’
‘I’m surprised you should have been gulled so easily,’ said Tuppence scornfully. ‘Did you really think I was the kind of girl to roll about on the floor and whine for mercy?’
‘You may do – some day!’ said the other significantly.
The cold malignity of her manner sent an unpleasant chill down Tuppence’s spine, but she was not going to give in to it.
‘Supposing we sit down,’ she said pleasantly. ‘Our present attitude is a little melodramatic. No – not on the bed. Draw a chair up to the table, that’s right. Now I’ll sit opposite you with the revolver in front of me – just in case of accidents. Splendid. Now, let’s talk.’
‘What about?’ said Mrs Vandemeyer sullenly.
Tuppence eyed her thoughtfully for a minute. She was remembering several things. Boris’s words, ‘I believe you would sell – us!’ and her answer, ‘The price would have to be enormous,’ given lightly, it was true, yet might not there be a substratum of truth in it? Long ago, had not Whittington asked: ‘Who’s been blabbing? Rita?’ Would Rita Vandemeyer prove to be the weak spot in the armour of Mr Brown?
Keeping her eyes fixed steadily on the other’s face, Tuppence replied quietly:
‘Money –’
Mrs Vandemeyer started. Clearly, the reply was unexpected.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ll tell you. You said just now that you had a long memory. A long memory isn’t half as useful as a long purse! I dare say it relieves your feelings a good deal to plan out all sorts of dreadful things to do to me, but is that practical? Revenge is very unsatisfactory. Everyone always says so. But money’ – Tuppence warmed to her pet creed – ‘well, there’s nothing unsatisfactory about money, is there?’
‘Do you think,’ said Mrs Vandemeyer scornfully, ‘that I am the kind of woman to sell my friends?’
‘Yes,’ said Tuppence promptly, ‘if the price was big enough.’
‘A paltry hundred pounds or so!’
‘No,’ said Tuppence. ‘I should suggest – a hundred thousand!’
Her economical spirit did not permit her to mention the whole million dollars suggested by Julius.
A flush crept over Mrs Vandemeyer’s face.
‘What did you say?’ she asked, her fingers playing nervously with a brooch on her breast. In that moment Tuppence knew that the fish was hooked, and for the first time she felt a horror of her own money-loving spirit. It gave her a dreadful sense of kinship to the woman fronting her.
‘A hundred thousand pounds,’ repeated Tuppence.
The light died out of Mrs Vandemeyer’s eyes. She leaned back in her chair.
‘Bah!’ she said. ‘You haven’t got it.’
‘No,’ admitted Tuppence, ‘I haven’t – but I know someone who has.’
‘Who?’
‘A friend of mine.’
‘Must be a millionaire,’ remarked Mrs Vandemeyer unbelievingly.
‘As a matter of fact he is. He’s an American. He’ll pay you that without a murmur. You can take it from me that it’s a perfectly genuine proposition.’
Mrs Vandemeyer sat up again.
‘I’m
