“A proof,” she broke in passionately, “of my willingness to do something, and to be something that I could not do and could not be! And you made that out of it, with only those torn scraps to go by! Oh, you understand. I see that you do understand!” She hid her face in her hands and cried. In a moment, however, she put aside her own emotion, and explained: “He—Mr. Mortimer—had tried to make love to me many times; you both know that. Norman was furious with him, and I was always afraid that there would be trouble between them. Of my part of it—well, it is much harder to speak. Being men, perhaps you will not understand the sort of power of fascination that a man can have over a woman, even when she does not love him. I shall always believe that Alan Mortimer had some hypnotic power—however, that is not the point. Though I had always repulsed him, he could not help knowing that he had influence over me; a man always knows. You see, I don’t try to lie; I tell you the truth, even though it isn’t a pleasant sort of truth to tell.” “I know it is most painful to tell,” Barrison said, feeling indeed profoundly sorry for her, and most respectful of her courage in speaking as she did. Norman Crane said nothing. “That night—the first night,” Sybil went on, “Alan Mortimer made it especially—hard for me. He had chosen an ornament for me, a splendid jeweled thing, but I had refused it several times. That night, he sent it to me with a note, and told me that he expected me to wear it that evening, after the play was over.” “Have you got it now?” asked Barrison. She reached out to a small table near by and took it from a hand bag. “I have never been separated from it,” she said simply. “It is too valuable, and—until to-day—I did not know just what to do with it.” In another moment it lay before them—the case “as long as a hand,” which Mrs. Parry had seen the girl hide in the front of her dress. In yet another instant the case was open, and the splendid piece of jewelry that was within flashed in the morning sunshine. It was a pendant of sapphires and diamonds, and it was the sort of thing that would be extremely becoming to Sybil Merivale. Crane suppressed with difficulty a sound of rage as he saw it. Barrison cut it off quickly by saying: “You told us you did not know what to do with it until to-day. Why to-day?” “Because”—Sybil took up a morning paper, looked at a particular place, and dropped it again—“because to-day I know that Miss Legaye was engaged to him, and that, therefore, anything that he had, when he died, belongs to her. I am going to send the pendant to Miss Legaye.” She closed the case with an air of finality. “Isn’t that what I ought to do?” she asked, half anxiously, looking from one to the other. Norman Crane, who had been sitting moodily staring at the floor, suddenly lifted his head and bent to kiss her hand.