"John Fordham's wife. In English law it is the same. You were John Fordham's servant. You came to England with him and his wife and exercised authority in his house. I am acquainted with every particular of your conduct during the years you remained with them. You hated your master, and conspired against him. Your mistress was a drunkard, and you secretly supplied her with liquor." "She gave me orders, and I obeyed them." "You went much further than that, madame. You invented lying stories against your master, you gave secret evidence against him. I could entertain you for an hour with the details of your treachery and that of other enemies of his with whom you were in collusion. It succeeded too well. It drove him from his home, it drove him from his country. Confess, madame, that I am well informed." "I confess nothing. I wait." "Do not wait too long, madame. I pass over the intervening years, and come straight to the peril in which you stand--a peril which, if you do not avert it by your own action, your own immediate action, madame, will make a convict of you. You know what that means, do you not? A convict--so many years' imprisonment--hard labor--no more red wine, no more nice French dishes. Somewhat over a year ago a brutal murder was committed in Liverpool, and quite lately your former master, Mr. John Fordham, laboring under a singular hallucination, accuses himself of the murder of his half-brother Louis." I kept my eyes on her face as I mentioned the name, but not a muscle moved. "It is his own business," she said, "not mine." "I shall prove to you that it is yours in an indirect manner. You know of this murder, you know that John Fordham is in prison on the charge of committing it. It is my turn to wait now, madame." "Say that I know of it. What then?" "This. You are aware that Louis Fordham was not murdered, you are aware that he is this day alive, and that John Fordham is innocent of the crime of which he accused himself, and for which you would like to see him hanged. You are intimately acquainted with Louis, you know where he lives. Last night, when I was in your shop, a man was concealed behind this green curtain." "It was not Monsieur Louis," she cried, and then she bit her lip, as though she had said too much. "No, madame," I said, smiling, "it was not Monsieur Louis. The man was your dead mistress' brother, Maxwell. You see, madame, we have been keeping watch on you. We have even the evidence of the rascal you married under a deplorable misrepresentation. I refer to Monsieur Whybrow." "Ah!" she exclaimed. "The ingr-rate!"