The evening of the previous Tuesday was to be the time; the opera house, during the performance of _La Pucella_, the place. Straithwaite, who was not interested in that precise form of drama, would not be expected to be present, but with a false moustache and a few other touches which his experience as an amateur placed within his easy reach, he was to occupy a stall, an end stall somewhere beneath his wife's box. At an agreed signal Stephanie would jerk open the catch of the necklace, and as she leaned forward the ornament would trickle off her neck and disappear into the arena beneath. Straithwaite, the only one prepared for anything happening, would have no difficulty in securing it. He would look up quickly as if to identify the box, and with the jewels in his hand walk deliberately out into the passage. Before anyone had quite realized what was happening he would have left the house. Carrados turned his face from the woman to the man. "This scheme commended itself to you, Mr Straithwaite?" "Well, you see, Stephanie is so awfully clever that I took it for granted that the thing would go all right." "And three days before, Bellitzer had already reported misrepresentation and that two necklaces had been used!" "Yes," admitted Straithwaite, with an air of reluctant candour, "I had a suspicion that Stephanie's native ingenuity rather fizzled there. You know, Stephanie dear, there _is_ a difference, it seems, between Bombay and Californian pearls." "The wretch!" exclaimed the girl, grinding her little teeth vengefully. "And we gave him champagne!" "But nothing came of it; so it doesn't matter?" prompted Straithwaite. "Except that now Markhams' pearls have gone and they are hinting at all manner of diabolical things," she wrathfully reminded him. "True," he confessed. "That is by way of a sequel, Mr Carrados. I will endeavour to explain that part of the incident, for even yet Stephanie seems unable to do me justice." He detached himself from the arm of the chair and lounged across the room to another chair, where he took up exactly the same position. "On the fatal evening I duly made my way to the theatre--a little late, so as to take my seat unobserved. After I had got the general hang I glanced up occasionally until I caught Stephanie's eye, by which I knew that she was there all right and concluded that everything was going along quite jollily. According to arrangement, I was to cross the theatre immediately the first curtain fell and standing opposite Stephanie's box twist my watch chain until it was certain that she had seen me. Then Stephanie was to fan herself three times with her programme. Both, you will see, perfectly innocent operations, and yet conveying to each other the intimation that all was well. Stephanie's idea, of course. After that, I would return to my seat and Stephanie would do her part at the first opportunity in Act II.