"You may well start, and look uncomfortable at the mention of Mary Griffiths' name, especially when you reflect on the position she is now in, owing to your--shall we call it, discreet behaviour? You informed us that all was going on well, and yet, on the night on which you, yourself, had arranged that the _coup_ should be brought off, almost immediately Mary Griffiths gained access to the house she was arrested. When we asked you to explain, you were so good as to tell us that it was absolutely necessary to allow her to be arrested in order to draw suspicion off yourself, and, by way of solace, you added the information that you had, at any rate, got hold of four hundred pounds' worth of her ladyship's jewels. From all we learnt we could not but suppose that you had made a slight mistake, and that by four hundred you meant four thousand. Jewels to the value of more than four thousand pounds appear to have gone; if you have not got them, then who has? The question is rather a nice one, don't you think?" The speaker paused as if for a reply. None came. Mrs Bankes was trembling in every limb. She perceived, even more clearly than those in front of her, how close she was standing to the brink of a chasm. "When we perceived your reluctance to communicate with us, our doubts as to your perfect trustworthiness began to amount to something stronger than suspicion--particularly when we learnt that, not content with betraying Mary Griffiths, you proposed to betray us too; to slip away to a quiet little shelter of your own, and there have a good time on the proceeds of the property which, whosesoever it was, had been procured, so far as you were concerned, very much at our expense. So, since it had clearly become a question of diamond cut diamond, we contrived a little scheme by means of which we hoped to lure you up to town. Our little scheme has succeeded even beyond our expectations. You came to town; you came here; and now that we have got you here, you may take my word for it that we don't mean to let you go till we have had an opportunity of crying quits. First of all, hand over those jewels. Not, you understand, four hundred, but four thousand pounds' worth." "But I haven't got them. I assure you--" "Silence! We don't want any of your assurances, we don't want words from you of any sort or kind. I fancy that at talk we should find you more than a match for us. I'll tell you what we're going to do. We're going to ask you to hand over those jewels, and if you don't hand them over at once, to our satisfaction, we're going to strip you. If we don't find them concealed in your clothing, as, for my part, I think we probably shall do, we're going to find out where they are concealed, if we have to kill you to do it. I tell you, frankly, that I should have as little compunction in killing you as I should have in killing a snake which had tried to bite me. For such as you, plain killing is too good. Hand over those jewels."