There was a gleam of her notorious audacity with all this; but it was like the glow of flowers on a grave. The horror of things to happen had never possessed her valiant eyes, and yet it must have been there, for all at once Dollar missed it. He read her look. He had relieved her mind about the man in the cell, only to open it at last to the man in his grave. Grief crippled her as horror had not; prisons could be broken, but not the prison to which her hand had sent a fellow creature. Yet her grief was mastered in its turn, forced out of sight before his eyes, even while her flippant speech rang through him as the bravest utterance he had ever heard. It blew a bugle in the man's brain, and the call was clear and definite. He knew his own mind only less instantaneously than he had penetrated hers. Never in all his days had he known his mind quite so well as when she thought better of the very words which had enlightened him, and went on to add to them in another key: "So now, Doctor Dollar, will you crown all your great kindness by taking me to see the Home Secretary at once?" "Lady Vera," he exclaimed, with unreasonable irritation, "what is the good of asking impossibilities? I couldn't take you to Topham Vinson even if I would. He would begin by doubting your sanity; there would be all manner of silly difficulties. Moreover, he's not in town." She showed displeasure at the statement of fact only. "Doctor Dollar, are you serious?" "Perfectly." "Have you forgot that I saw you together at almost two o'clock?" "I think not quite so late as that. The Home Secretary left Euston at 2:45." "Where for?" She looked panic-stricken. "I'll tell you, Lady Vera, if you promise not to follow him by the next train." "When does it go?" "Not for some time. There's only one more; we debated which he should take. But you mustn't take the other, Lady Vera; you must leave that to me. I want you to leave the whole thing to me--from this very moment till you hear from me again." "When would that be, Doctor Dollar?" "As soon as I have seen Mr. Vinson." "You would undertake to tell him everything?" "Every detail, exactly as you have told me." "Will it seem credible at second-hand?" "Quite enough so to justify a respite. That's the first object; and this is the first step to it, believe me! There's plenty of time between this and--Tuesday." "Oh! I know that," she returned, bluntly disdainful of a well-meant hesitation. "There's still not a moment to lose while that poor man lies facing death." "I'm not sure that he does, Lady Vera. The decision's only just been made; it won't be out till the day after to-morrow. I don't believe they would break it to Croucher on Christmas Day." "They can break the good news instead. Where is Mr. Vinson? It's all right, I won't attempt to tackle him till you have. That's a promise--and I don't break them like windows!"