Gerard insisted on his patient going to bed without further delay. She was flushed and excited by her own revelations, and would have willingly gone on talking till midnight, if her doctor had allowed it. But he wished her good-night, and went downstairs to summon the well-meaning Jemima, who was a very good sick nurse, having ministered to a large family of stepbrothers and stepsisters, through teething, measles, chicken-pox, mumps, and all the ills that infant flesh is heir to. George Gerard communicated early next day with Mr. Leopold, and that gentleman came at once to Mrs. Evitt’s bedside, where he had a long and friendly conversation with that lady, who was well enough to be inordinately loquacious. She was quite fascinated by the famous lawyer, whose manners seemed to her the perfection of courtesy, and she remarked afterwards that if her own neck had been in peril she could hardly have refused to answer any questions he asked her. Once master of his facts, at first hand, Mr. Leopold called a hansom, and drove to the shady retreat where his client was languishing in durance. Laura was with her husband when the lawyer came. She started up, pale and agitated, at his entrance, looking to him as the one man who was to save an innocent life. ‘Good news,’ said Leopold cheerily. ‘Thank God,’ murmured Laura, sinking back in her chair. ‘We have found the murderer.’ ‘Found him,’ cried Treverton; ‘how, and where?’ ‘When I say found, I go rather too far,’ said Leopold, ‘but we know who he is. It’s the man I suspected from the beginning--your second-floor lodger, Desrolles.’ Laura gave a cry of horror. ‘You need not pity him, Mrs. Treverton,’ said Mr. Leopold. ‘He’s a thorough-paced scoundrel. I happen to be acquainted with circumstances that throw a light upon his motive for the murder. He is quite unworthy of your compassion. I doubt if hanging--in the gentlemanly way in which it’s done now--is bad enough for him. He ought to have lived in a less refined age, when he would have had his last moments enlivened by the yells and profanity of the populace.’ ‘How do you know that Desrolles was the murderer?’ asked John Treverton. Mr. Leopold told his client the gist of Mrs. Evitt’s statement. Treverton listened in silence. Laura sat quietly by, white as marble.