ink sketches, scores of little things which she had done for her own
amusement. She bit her lip as an idea flashed through her mind.

He shook his head again mournfully.

"Somewhere," she said slowly, "I have read that clever forgers use
water colors and pen and ink like regular artists. Think--think! Is
there no way that we--that I could forge a check that would give us
breathing space, perhaps rescue us?"

Carlton leaned over the table toward her, fascinated. He placed both
his hands on hers. They were icy, but she did not withdraw them.

For an instant they looked into each other's eyes, an instant, and
then they understood. They were partners in crime, amateurs perhaps,
but partners as they had been in honesty.

It was a new idea that she had suggested to him. Why should he not
act on it? Why hesitate? Why stop at it? He was already an
embezzler. Why not add a new crime to the list? As he looked into
her eyes he felt a new strength. Together they could do it. Hers was
the brain that had conceived the way out. She had the will, the
compelling power to carry the thing through. He would throw himself
on her intuition, her brain, her skill, her daring.

On his desk in the corner, where often until far into the night he
had worked on the huge ruled sheets of paper covered with figures of
the firm's accounts, he saw two goose-necked vials, one of lemon-
colored liquid, the other of raspberry color. One was of tartaric
acid, the other of chloride of lime. It was an ordinary ink