The long envelope inclosed something crisp and firm that immediately suggested bank notes. Madame Storey has taught me to notice such things. The messenger who brought it required a receipt in her own hand. After I had handed him his receipt and returned to my employer’s room, I saw the bills scattered on her desk: five smooth, fresh, orange-backed engravings direct from the Federal Reserve Bank, the prettiest pictures on earth. They were thousand-dollar bills, the first I had ever seen. Those five scraps of paper were equivalent to a trip around the world, a high-powered car, or any delightful folly that one might dream about. To me it was a lot of money.
Mme. Storey was reading the letter which had accompanied it. Seeing me goggle at the money, she said airily: ‘That’s only our retaining fee, Bella. There is ten times as much in this case, if we can pull it off. Besides an unlimited expense account.’
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