"Yes, I think I am brave. I can guess what you are about to suggest, with the detectives watching us outside." She burst into a little sob. "Oh, you always thought you were so clever, and yet, if I had had the management of affairs, things might have been so different." He spoke humbly. "I think you are right, Norah. I was always full of arrogance and self-conceit. You were weaker in character than I was, but you had always more brains. And I was a blind fool not to admit it. Many a time you gave me your advice, and I rejected it." "And what do you suggest now?" she asked, in a voice that had sunk to a whisper. He looked at her steadily. He had screwed up his courage to the sticking point. Could he count upon an equal fortitude in her? "It is the finish, old girl. You say the detectives are waiting outside. Bryant has got a good case, and the diary will hang us. There is no getting over that." "You propose--" she said falteringly. He spoke quite steadily. The end had come, he had made up his mind, so far as regards himself. "We neither of us want to hang for the murder of Hugh Murchison?" She shuddered, and hid her face with her hands. "Oh, that awful evening! It has been like a nightmare ever since." "I know," said Dutton soothingly. "It was one of my fatal mistakes. But it is no use crying over spilt milk. To-night we are face to face with facts. We have gambled, and we have lost, and we have got to pay the penalty." The wretched woman rose up, and wrung her hands. "And to think I might have been the Countess of Southleigh." "I know; don't think I am not reckoning up all that," replied Dutton. "But we have got to deal with facts to-night, with the detectives waiting outside. The game is up, you know that as well as I do. We have only a few hours before us, perhaps a few minutes, in which to make the choice." "I know," she answered. "You mean our only alternative is to cheat the law." He looked at her steadily. "That is the only way. If we suffer ourselves to be taken, we have not got a dog's chance." Weak woman as she was, she gathered something of his iron resolution. Yes, they must die and die together, to cheat the law. Such was to be the end of the brilliant adventuress who had inveigled two men into marriage, Jack Pomfret and Guy Spencer, with her subtle and elusive charm. "And what do you suggest, George? You have thought of these things more than I have." "I have always thought of them," said Dutton gloomily. "Well, there are various ways I can suggest to you. I can shoot you first, and myself afterwards." She shuddered. "Some other way than that." "I can give you some tabloids." "Is there any pain?" she queried. "Hardly any." She shuddered again. "Hardly any. That does not sound very convincing."