h bully now. "It won't cut any ice
with me or with Mr. Mangan. It didn't this morning or he wouldn't have
sent me down here. We want that mantilla and we got to have it. If we
don't there'll be trouble. If you know anything about it, now's the
time to say so. The woman you call Mrs. Stanton got all balled up this
morning, and couldn't say what she did with it. They all do that--we get
half a dozen of 'em every week. She's pawned it all right--what I want
to know is WHERE. Rosenthal's in a hole if we don't get it. If you've
spent the money, I've got a roll right here." And he tapped his pocket.
"No questions asked, remember! All I want is the mantilla, and if
it don't come she'll be in the Tombs and you'll go with her. We mean
business, and don't you forget it!"

Martha turned squarely upon him--was about to speak--changed her
mind--and drawing up a chair, settled down upon it.

"You're a nice young man, you are!" she exclaimed, scornfully. "A very
nice young man! And you think that poor child is a thief, do you? Do
you know who she is and what she's suffered? If I could tell you, you'd
never get over it, you'd be that ashamed!"

She was not afraid of him; her army hospital experience had thrown her
with too many kinds of men. What filled her with alarm was his reference
to Lady Barbara. But for this uncertainty, and the possible consequences
of such a procedure, she would have thrown open her door and ordered him
out as she had done Dalton. Then, seeing that Pickert still maintained
his attitude--that of a setter-dog with the bird in the line of his
nose--she added testily:

"Don't stand there staring at me. Take a chair where I can talk to you
better. You get on my nerves. It's pawned, is it? Yes. I believe you,
and I know who pawned it. Dalton's got it--that's who. I thought so
last night--now I'm sure of it." She was on her feet now, tearing at her
bonnet-string as if to free her throat. "He sneaked it out of that box
on the floor beside you, when she was hiding from him in her bedroom."

Pickert retreated slightly at this new development; then asked sharply:
"Dalton! Who's Dalton?"

"The meanest cur that ever walked the earth--that's who he is. He's
almost killed my poor lady, and now she must go to jail to please him.
Not if I'm alive, she won't. He stole that mantilla! I'm just as sure of
it as I am that my name is Martha Munger!"

Pickert's high tension relaxed. If this new clew had to be followed it
coul