"Heaven forgive me!" groaned the bridegroom, shaking both fists in the air, as he sat in the armchair from which his wife had leaped. "I wish that woman would either be gathered peacefully to her ancestors, or--or get married again!" Then he turned to find the eye of the house detective upon him. "Huh!" said that individual, "if you dared maybe you'd add murder to larceny! How about it?" CHAPTER XIV SOME SLEUTH "Now, stop right where you are," said Miss Solomons, as John Ryder started to rise. "I'll search you later--and that woman. I knew there was somethin' fishy about all this. I was a chump not to see into it right at the start. Of course Mrs. Judson is just the sort of a party a pair of crooks would get their hooks into." "Say, are you crazy, or am I?" "Sit down!" At Ryder's second attempt to rise the house detective unlimbered her artillery. For the life of him Ryder could not guess where she could hide the big revolver about her person, she was so thin. Holding the weapon recklessly aimed in his direction, Miss Solomons began to search the sitting-room scientifically. In the bed chamber Ruth could be heard soothing the refractory patient. Mrs. Judson was still bewailing the loss of her jewelry. "My rings! My brooches! My necklace!" she kept repeating, her voice rising in crescendo until John Ryder thought the whole hotel would be roused and come crowding into his suite. "But, Mrs. Judson," Ruth said, when the heavy lady stopped for breath, "you know you did not wear your necklace or a brooch here. Only your rings----" "My rings! Where are my rings, then?" demanded the invalid, and the bed-spring creaked as she dropped upon it again. "I know I have been robbed!" "Sure thing!" muttered Miss Solomons, still holding John Ryder under the point of her weapon while she poked into the umbrella stand near the door with his walking stick. Then Ruth, in a very small voice: "Why, I--I took them off, Mrs. Judson." "Ha!" was Miss Solomon's comment, leaving the umbrella stand. "What for? My rings!" cried Mrs. Judson. "The doctor told me to. We wanted to chafe your hands. I----" "What did you do with them?" snapped Miss Solomons, and tore aside the curtain so as to get a view of the bed chamber. This time Ryder rose up, pistol or not. "Come away from there!" he commanded. "Anybody but an idiot would see that my wife knows nothing about the woman's rings." "Your wife? You mean your accomplice," sneered the house detective. "By heaven! If you were only a man!" gasped Ryder, and took a stride toward Miss Solomons. "This here's loaded," said that woman firmly, and stuck the barrel of her revolver against his waistband again. "No foolin' with me. Sit down. Come on out here, you!" she added over her shoulder to Ruth. "Why--why, what is the matter?" the latter gasped, coming to the doorway. "Oh!" "What did you do with the rings?" demanded the house detective.