"Yes. It was Eric's old pet name for me. He wrote that letter to me, giving me the emeralds if I would cease asking for his love. He said I knew where the jewels were, because he always kept them in the panelled space,--that's what we called it,--and Joyce did overhear him saying to me in the studio practically what he had written in the letter. Had she not been so wrapped up in her own heart trouble, she would have heard it clearly. Of course, too, that little golden heart that was bought and never presented was meant for me." "You told Orienta to say that Mr. Stannard said 'Neither Natalie _nor_ Joyce.'?" "Yes, for I really think that was what he did mean to say. He wouldn't implicate me, even with his dying breath, but he tried to clear them. He was a wonderful man, Mr. Ford. Not a good man, perhaps, but a brave one. He would have defended any or all of us, but he had no chance. My love for him has been the mainspring of my whole life. Instead of forgetting him, I grew more madly in love with him year by year. I had no business to come here, and let him paint me. Those hours when I posed for him were the happiest I have ever known. That's why the portrait is of a happy woman. I hoped against hope that I could yet win him back. But I couldn't--I can only follow him." The quietness of Beatrice's voice had lulled any suspicions Ford might have had of her intent, and when she drew from the folds of her bodice an etching needle, exactly like the one that had killed Eric, and drove it into her own breast, Ford wheeled suddenly and grasped her hand,--but too late. The deed was done. At his exclamation, Joyce ran down from the hall above, where she had been listening to Beatrice's story. She sank down beside the wounded woman and took the drooping figure in her arms. "Forgive----" moaned Beatrice. "Joyce,--forgive,--I--I loved him so." "Yes,--yes," soothed Joyce, scarce knowing what she said. "What can we do, Mr. Ford? Oh, what can we do?" "Nothing, I fear. Call help. Shall I ring?" Ford hastened to the nearest bell he could notice and rang it. Immediately people began to gather, servants, family,--and all sorts of contradictory orders were given. But with his finger on the pulse of the dying woman the detective tried to learn yet more facts. "The will," he asked, bending above her. "Who changed it?" "Eric himself," Beatrice answered, "that's why--oh, Eric!" Her faced beamed with a strange radiance, and then sinking back in Joyce's arms, Beatrice Faulkner breathed her last. The next day Alan Ford declared he must hasten away as his engagements were pressing. "But tell us more of your work," implored Bobsy Roberts, "give us a few moments more." "And tell us about that clairvoyant woman," said Barry. "If she was a fake, how did she read those papers in the dark?"