For the first time Lawrence showed signs of indignation. Cool and logical as he had hitherto been, he could not quite restrain himself in the presence of this woman, who had no shame or remorse, or anything save admiring curiosity.

"Directly Bruce told his story," he went on presently, "I knew exactly what had happened. I knew all about the motor car also. Then it was time for me to act. I was using the house as a kind of trap for you one night when Mr. Charlton appeared. He was good enough to pardon the liberty we had taken and to tell us his story. Then I began to see my way pretty clear. It was I who caused you to be informed about the missing diamonds being still in the well. I had found out that you were in desperate need of money. Isidore let me into that, also through him I got to know Maitrank. You came for the diamonds, but you did not get the real ones, for the simple reason that I had already been down the well and got them for myself. They were simply and plainly set, so that I had no trouble in getting paste imitations.

"So far, so good. Maitrank comes on the scene and asks for his money. You have no money, therefore you give him your diamonds. You try to get them back from him, but you fail in the long run, owing to the courage of a young girl, who has watched the whole proceedings. I have purposely refrained from dwelling upon the valuable aid Miss Lawrence has given us all through."

Leona passed her tongue over her dry lips.

"I wish I had known," she murmured. "Oh, I wish I had known."

"I dare say," said Lawrence, drily, "but you didn\'t know. There would have been another murder on your soul had it not been for my niece. Maitrank was furious. But he was a valuable ally to me, in fact I calculated on that. By his means I forced a confession from you that it was yourself who paid the rest of those notes to Isidore, and this I can prove out of your own mouth, by the production of that tuberose perfume. You were mad and desperate that night to part with the last of your store."

"How did you know it was the last of my store?" Leona cried.

"Why, it could not logically have been otherwise. Would you have produced those notes above all others if they had not been the last you possessed?"

"True," Leona murmured, "true. You are too strong for me."

"Meanwhile the clouds were gathering around you. Prout finds your husband\'s brother by a happy chance. Once he has done this, things become easy for us. The more easy they become for us the more desperate they grow for you. Then you decide that you must recover those notes from Isidore. You take out your motor car, so cunningly disguised in blacklead----"

"That is true; but how did you know?"

"From Miss Lawrence\'s evidence at the first inquest. Also the evidence of the reporter. The car was draped, they said. In places it shone. Those places were where the lead was rubbed off; you could make the car sombre black and brilliantly light at will.

"You used to lock it up in the yard here. We find a fresh cake of blacklead in the scullery, which completely puzzle............