"Perhaps I had better be a little more candid with you," Mary sighed. "There is a scheme on foot between my brother and some of the gang to gain possession of certain papers that belonged to Sir Charles Darryll. There are keys, too, which Mrs. Richford is known to possess. I don't quite know what the scheme is." "Anyway I can give a pretty good guess," Mark said. "My father has been very ill and he sent for me. We have not been very good friends, my father and I, because I turned my back on the city for the sake of art. But all that is past now, and we have become reunited. My father seems to know a great deal about Sir Charles's affairs--something about a ruby mine or something of that kind. Anyway, I'm to get my information from Mr. Fleming, who is my father's solicitor. But I am afraid that I am interrupting you." "There is not much more to tell," Mary went on. "Colonel Berrington was induced to write a letter to Mrs. Richford asking her to come here and see my brother." "Berrington must have been mad to think of such a thing!" "No, he did it at my instigation. I managed to communicate with him and assure him that no harm should come of it. No harm would have come of it if I had only kept my head and done the right thing. But the fact remains that Mrs. Richford is in there; she has those diamonds in her pocket and the thieves are on the track. It seems to me----" Mary did not finish the sentence, for Mark held out a hand and pulled her behind a bush, just in time, as two other people came up the path. There was no occasion to tell either of the watchers that here were the people of whom they were talking. The man Reggie and the woman Cora were standing on the doorstep whispering together. It was quite a still night and the other two behind the bushes could hear every word that was said. "So far, so good," the man was saying. "We've got here and we are pretty sure that our bird is securely caged, but what next?" "Wait our chance," the woman said with a certain fierce indrawing of her breath. "We can appear to have come here by accident, for instructions, anything. So long as Sartoris does not know about those stones we are safe. When we get them----" "When we get them, Richford can whistle for his share of the money," the man said coolly. "By this time to-morrow we shall be in possession of more money than we have ever had before. I don't like this present business, it's far too dangerous. Unless we go so far as to murder that fellow Berrington and get him out of the way----" "Don't," the woman said with a shudder. "I hate that kind of work. Anything clever or cunning, anything requiring audacity, I can do with. But violence!" She shuddered again, and the man laughed softly as if greatly pleased with some idea of his.