“Sit down!” invited the Hawk, indicating one with the muzzle of his automatic. The Frenchman sat down with a helpless and abandoned gesture of despair. The Hawk took the other chair. He opened the bag, opened the lead box, and laid the lead capsule on the table. “Do you identify this?” he inquired pleasantly.
“One moment, please, Doctor Meunier!” he murmured. “You recognise it? You are satisfied that it is your tube of radium?”
“And it is worth, you say, a hundred thousand dollars?”
“But, yes, I tell you!” cried the Frenchman. “A hundred thousand—certainly, it is worth that!”
“Quite so!” said the Hawk placidly. “Therefore, Doctor Meunier, a comparatively small sum—eh?—you would be willing to pay that—a sum, I might add, that would be quite within your means.”
“Quite within my means?” repeated the Frenchman a little dazedly.
“Yes,” said the Hawk sweetly. “And to be specific, let us say—whatever is in your pocketbook.” The Frenchman drew back in his chair. His face blanched.
“You—you mean to rob me!” he exclaimed hoarsely.
“I do not see it quite in that light.” The Hawk's voice was pained. “But we will not discuss the ethics involved—we probably should not agree. I did not steal your precious capsule from you, and I am returning it, not, I might say, without having incurred considerable personal risk in so doing. Perhaps we might better agree if we called it—a reward.”
The Hawk's automatic tapped the table top with a hint of petulance.
“And—and what guarantee have I,” the Frenchman burst out, “that you will give me the tube after you have taken my money?”
“My word,” said the Hawk evenly. “And—I am waiting, Doctor Meunier!”
The Frenchman hesitated, then, with an oath, flung his pocketbook upon the table. The Hawk opened it, extracted the wad of bills that he had seen exhibited in the superintendent's office, smiled as he fingered them, and put them in his pocket. He pushed the lead capsule across the table—and suddenly, as the other reached for it, the Hawk was on his feet, his automatic flung forward, his left hand grasping the other's sleeve.
They held that way for an instant, eying each other—the Hawk's left hand slowly pushing back the other's right-hand sleeve. And then the Hawk's eyes shifted—to a long, jagged, white scar on the bare forearm just above the wrist.