"You silly fool!" said Kathleen.

She knew what she must do, in spite of never having done it before. Soundlessly she slid along the wall, fingers searching. Then she had opened a paneled door, slipped through it, locked it behind her and raced along a dim-lit private corridor to a door at the end. It opened at her touch onto a large, luxuriously furnished office room.

In sudden fright at the boldness of her action, Kathleen stood in the doorway, staring at the powerful-looking man who sat at a desk writing by the light of a shaded desk lamp. Kier Gray did not look up immediately. She knew after a moment that he was aware of her presence and she took courage from his silence to observe him.

There was something magnificent about this ruler of men that held her admiration even now, when the fear of him lay like a weight inside her. The strong features of the man formed a noble countenance, now thoughtfully bent over the letter he was writing.

As he wrote, she was able to follow the surface of his thought, but nothing else. For Kier Gray, she had found out long ago, shared with that most hateful of men, John Petty, the ability to think in her presence without deviation, in a manner that made mind reading a practical impossibility. Only those surface thoughts were there, the words of the letter he was writing. And her excitement and impatience overrode any interest in his letter. She burst out, "There's a man in my room. He tried to kill me."

Kier Gray looked up. His face held a harder expression now that it was turned full upon her. The noble qualities of the profile were lost in the determination and power of that lean, strong jaw. Kier Gray, master of men, stared at her coldly. When he spoke, his mind moved with such precision, and voice and mind were so closely coordinated, that she wasn't sure whether or not he had actually uttered any words.