"I covered it with a sheet of paper, and got him to sign it,
thinking that he was signing the other."
"Did he know what you had done?"
"Yes; I killed him before he could tell any one else and have
the will destroyed."
The voice was still. There was silence, broken by the sound of
some one moving. The room was filled with a bright light. The
voice came again.
"Isabel Burney!"
The woman on her knees, dropping her hands, looked round. By a
lighted lamp which rested on a writing-table stood Margaret
Wallace. Whether Mrs. Lamb realised that she was looking at the
girl herself, or supposed that she was confronted by a
materialised phantom, has never been certainly known. She stared
at her surlily, unblinkingly, affrightedly, as one might stare
at some unpleasing object in a dream. The girl repeated the
questions which had already been answered. As one listened the
last remnants of doubt vanished as to whose was the voice which
had already made itself so prominent.
"Did you trick Cuthbert Grahame into signing a will in which he
left all that he had to you, when he supposed himself to be
signing one in which he left it all to me?"
There was a momentary hesitation, then the answer, spoken
sullenly, half beneath her breath, yet plain enough.
"Yes; I did."
"And did you then kill him because you feared discovery of what
you had done?"
"Yes; I did."
There was another movement on the other side of the room. When
Mrs. Lamb looked round she found herself looking at Dr. Twelves,
who put a question to her on his own account.
"So you lied to me when you said those pillows must have
slipped--you knew better. As I suspected, you dragged them
away--you female fiend!"
His invective went unnoticed; there came the rather monotonous
refrain--
"Yes; I did".
There were other movements proceeding from all parts of the
room. On one side of her were Andrew McTavish and his partner,
Mr. Brown. Mr. McTavish was evidently very angry.
"And you lied to us when you pretended that you suspected us of
robbing you! You knew all along that the only robbery you
yourself had committed--you impudent swindler!"
He only received the same reply--
"Yes; I did".
Dr. Twelves wagged his finger at her, gruesomely.
"You shall hang for it, Isabel Burney--you shall hang by the
neck until you're dead!"
Mr. McTavish cried--
"At any rate, you shall be sent to penal servitude for the fraud
you have committed on us!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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