"I never see how servants spend their wages anyhow," she said. "But what makes me feel quite sure it isn't Evans is that I'm sure she would have confessed to me when I questioned her. Instead of that she's been packing my things for me just as usual." O'Bannon cut the interview short by announcing that he'd see the sheriff. Lydia had expected--"dreaded" was her own word--that he would say something about the incidents of their last meeting. But he didn't. He left the room, saying as he went: "You'll wait here until I've had a talk with the girl." His tone had a rising inflection of a question in it, but to Lydia it sounded like an order. She had had every intention of waiting, but now she began to contemplate the possibility of leaving at once. The car was at the door and her bags were on the car. How it would annoy him, she thought, if when he came back, instead of finding her patiently waiting to be civil, he learned that she had motored away, as much as to say: "It's your duty as an officer of the law to find my jewels, but it isn't my duty to be grateful to you." Presently Miss Bennett and the sheriff came in together, talking--at least the sheriff was talking. "It looks like it was her all right," he was saying, "and if so he'll get a confession out of her. That's why I sent for him. He's a great feller for getting folks to confess." Then with natural courtesy he turned to Lydia. "I was just saying to your friend, Miss Thorne, that O'Bannon's great on getting confessions." "Really?" said Lydia. "I wonder why." "Well," said the sheriff, ignoring the note of doubt in her wonder, "most criminals want to confess. It's a lonely thing--to have a secret and the whole world against you. He plays on that. And between you and I, Miss Thorne, there's some of this so-called psychology in it. You see, I prepare the way for him--telling how he always does get a confession, and how a confession last time saved the defendant from the chair, and a lot of stuff like that, and then he comes along, and I guess there's a little hypnotism in it too. Did you ever notice his eyes?" "I noticed that he has them," answered Lydia. Miss Bennett said that she had noticed them at once, as soon as he came into the room. Perhaps it was remembrance of them that made her add, "He won't be too hard on the poor girl, will he?" [Illustration: O'BANNON BEGINS HIS INVESTIGATION OF THE THEFT.] "No, ma'am, he won't be hard at all," said the sheriff. "He'll just talk with her ten or fifteen minutes, and then she'll want to tell him the truth. I couldn't say how it's done." Lydia suddenly stamped her foot. "She's a fool if she does!" she said, biting into her words.