"Good night. . . . Oh, Miss--" He didn't say "Omar"--"there
is a favor you might do me."

"Sure!" I wondered what it could be.

"Those diamonds. I've got to have them, you know, to send them
back to their owner. I don't mind helping a--a person who helps
himself to other people's things, but I can't let him get away
with his plunder without being that kind of person myself. So--"

Why didn't I lie? Because there are some people you don't lie to,
Tom Dorgan. Don't talk to me, you bully, I'm savage enough. To
have rings and pins and ear-rings, a whole bagful of diamonds,
and to haul 'em out of your pocket and lay 'em on the table there
before him!

"I wonder," he said slowly, as he put them away in his own
pocket, "what a man like me could do for a girl like you?"

"Reform her!" I snarled. "Show her how to get diamonds honestly."

Say, Tom, let's go in for bigger game.



III.


Oh, Mag, Mag, for heaven's sake, let me talk to you! No, don't