He took his unconventional half-seat on the edge of the table, with one foot on the floor and the other one lightly swinging. “Palford & Grimby are clever old ducks, and they know that much. Thing they’d know best would be that to set a raft of lies going about a man who’s got money enough to defend himself, and to make them pay big damages for it afterward, would be pretty bum business. I guess _they_ know all about what proof stands for. _They_ may have to wait; so may you, same as I have.”
Palliser realized that he was in the position of a man striking at an adversary whose construction was of india-rubber. He struck home, but left no bruise and drew no blood, which was an irritating thing. He lost his temper.
“Proof!” he jerked out. “There will be proof enough, and when it is made public, you will not control the money you threaten to use.”
“When you get _proof_, just you let me hear about it,” T. Tembarom said. “And all the money I’m threatening on shall go where it belongs, and I’ll go back to little old New York and sell papers if I have to. It won’t come as hard as you think.”
The flippant insolence with which he brazened out his pretense that he had not lied, that his ridiculous romance was actual and simple truth, suggested dangerous readiness of device and secret knowledge of power which could be adroitly used.
“You are merely marking time,” said Palliser, rising, with cold determination to be juggled with no longer. “You have hidden him away where you think you can do as you please with a man who is an invalid. That is your dodge. You’ve got him hidden somewhere, and his friends had better get at him before it is too late.”
“I’m not answering questions this evening, and I’m not giving addresses, though there are no witnesses to take them down. If he’s hidden away, he’s where he won’t be disturbed,” was T. Tembarom’s rejoinder. “You may lay your bottom dollar on that.”
Palliser walked toward the door without speaking. He had almost reached it when he whirled about involuntarily, arrested by a shout of laughter.
“Say,” announced Tembarom, “you mayn’t know it, but this lay-out would make a first-rate turn in a vaudeville. You _think_ I’m lying, I _look_ like I’m lying, I guess every word I say _sounds_ like I’m lying. To a fellow like you, I guess it couldn’t help sound that way. And I’m not lying. That’s where the joke comes in. I’m not lying. I’ve not told you all I know because it’s none of your business and wouldn’t help; but what I have told you is the stone-cold truth.”