"And you can look me in the face and say that? One night Lady Littimer snatched it from you and ran into the garden. You followed and struggled for the ring. And Mr. David Steel, who stood close by, felled you to the earth with a blow on the side of your head. I wonder he didn't kill you. I should have done so in his place. And yet it would be a pity to hang anyone for your death. See here!" Enid produced the ring from her pocket. Lord Littimer looked at it intently. "Have you seen this before, my dear?" he asked his wife. "Many a time," Lady Littimer said, sadly. "Take it away, it reminds me of too many bitter memories. Take it out of my sight." "An excellent forgery," Littimer murmured. "A forgery calculated to deceive many experts even. I will compare it with the original by and by." Henson listened with a sinking feeling at his heart. Was it possible, he wondered, that Lord Littimer had really recovered the original? He had had hopes of getting it back even now, and making it the basis of terms of surrender. Lady Littimer snatched the ring from Littimer's grasp and threw it through the open window into the garden. She stood up facing Henson, her head thrown back, her eyes flaming with a new resolution. It seemed hardly possible to believe that this fine, handsome woman with the white hair could be the poor demented creature that the others once had known. "Reginald Henson, listen to me," she cried. "For your own purpose you cruelly and deliberately set out to wreck the happiness of several lives. For mere money you did this; for sheer love of dissipation you committed this crime. You nearly deprived me of my reason. I say nothing about the money, because that is nothing by comparison. But the years that are lost can never come back to me again. When I think of the past and the past of my poor, unhappy boy I feel that I have no forgiveness for you. If you--Oh, go away; don't stay here--go. If I had known you were coming I should have forbidden you the house. Your mere presence unnerves me. Littimer, send him away." Littimer rose to his feet and rang the bell. "You will be good enough to rid me of your hateful presence," he said, "at once; now go." But Henson still stood irresolute. He fidgeted from one foot to the other. He seemed to have some trouble that he could find no expression for. "I want to go away," he murmured. "I want to leave the country. But at the present moment I am practically penniless. If you would advance me--" Littimer laughed aloud. "Upon my word," he said, "your coolness is colossal. I am going to prosecute you, I am doing my best to bring you into the dock. And you ask me--_me_, of all men--to find you money so that you can evade justice! Have you not had enough--are you never satisfied? Williams, will you see Mr. Henson off the premises?" The smiling Williams bowed low. "With the greatest possible pleasure, my lord," he said. "Any further orders, my lord?"