"The police!" echoed the little woman, growing pale under her carefully coloured face, and sinking into a chair. "Yes. If you did not kill the Colonel, Alpenny did." "No. I swear he was with me the whole time: he is as innocent as I am. You can do nothing." "I perhaps cannot prove you guilty," said Durban steadily, "but I can tell the police what Mrs. Snow saw, and get the whole case into the papers." "Who will care, when the Colonel died so long ago?" "His death is evidently connected with this Alpenny crime," said Durban harshly, "and so the public will be quite glad to read all about the earlier one. What will your friends say?--who will take your hand when he or she knows what I have to tell about that midnight meeting, and of your projected elopement with the notorious Major Ruck?" Lady Watson trembled and burst into tears, which, streaming down her face, aged her in a few minutes. "Beatrice, what am I to do?" she wept. "Give up the necklace," said the girl, keeping aloof--she could not find it in her heart to pity a mother who had behaved so badly to her child, a wife who had tricked her husband so often--"then we will leave you, and say nothing." "But if I give up the necklace, will you come and see me?" "Yes," said Beatrice with an effort; "after all, you are my mother." "You horrid girl! you are just like your father. Oh, well, if I am to be blackmailed by an unnatural child and a nigger, I must pay the price, and you may be glad that I don't give you both in charge." Durban crossed to the bell. "I will ring if you like. There is a constable outside." "No!" shrieked Lady Watson, and unfastened the necklace with trembling fingers. Durban took it from her in silence, and then she rallied sufficiently to rage. "You horrible black creature!" she cried, "you have stolen my property, and have turned from me the heart of my dear child. Go away, I hate the sight of you." "Come, missy," said Durban, holding open the door. "Yes, go--go, Beatrice. You've made me quite ill. I shan't enjoy my dinner a bit to-night, and there is such a good cook. I'll have to look after my face again--it's quite ruined." She tripped to the mirror and looked in perfectly calmly. While she did this Beatrice, sad at heart at such frivolity under such circumstances, withdrew with Durban, and they took their way to Mrs. Quail's hotel. "I'm glad you saved me from my mother, Durban," was all the girl said; but in the seclusion of her bedroom she wept bitterly. In those days, at that moment, the world was very grey and dismal. CHAPTER XXV WATERLOO