The wretched woman who had so suddenly been denounced by the man with whom she had been so friendly at Monte Carlo was standing in the centre of the room, swaying to and fro, supporting herself by clutching the edge of the small table. Her white lips trembled, but no word escaped them. She seemed rendered speechless by the suddenness of the overwhelming charge. The detective’s hard voice broke the silence. “Julie Fournereau,” he said, advancing a few steps towards her, “in the name of the law I arrest you for the murder of Reginald Thorne at Nice.” “I am innocent!” she cried hoarsely, her haggard eyes glaring at us with a hunted look in them. “I tell you I am innocent!” “Listen,” said Ernest in a firm tone, although there was a slight catch in his voice which told how excited he was. “The reasons which have led me to this step are briefly these. Last December I crossed from New York to Havre, and went south to spend the winter at Monte Carlo. I stayed at the Métropole, and amid the cosmopolitan crowd staying there met the woman before you. One day there arrived at the same hotel from Paris my friend, Reginald Thorne, whom I knew well in New York, but who had lived here in Paris for the past year. We were about together during the day, and in the Rooms that evening he encountered me walking beside this woman Fournereau. That same night he came to my room, and in confidence related me a story which at the moment I regarded as somewhat exaggerated, namely, how he had been induced to frequent a certain gaming-house in Paris where he had lost almost everything he possessed, and how he had ultimately discovered that an elaborate system of sharping had been practised upon him by this woman and a male accomplice. That woman, he told me, had left Paris suddenly just at the moment when he discovered the truth, and he had encountered her in the Rooms with me--her name was Julie Fournereau.” I glanced at the wretched woman before us. Her wild eyes were fixed upon the carpet, her fingers were twitching with intense agitation, her breath came and went in short, quick gasps. Ernest in his exposure was, indeed, merciless. “Had she seen him in the Rooms?” I inquired.