"A joke! I don"t know what you call a joke! It"ll be no joke for me.
There"s to be a meeting, and those stones will have to be produced for experts to examine. If they are not forthcoming, I shall have to explain what has become of them, and those are not the men to listen to any talk of kleptomania. And it isn"t the money they will want, it"s the stones. At this crisis those stones are worth a hundred thousand pounds to us, and more! It"ll be your ruin, and mine, if they are not found."
"They will be found. It is only a little game she plays. She hides, we seek and find. I think I may undertake to produce them for you in half-an-hour."
"I hope you will," said Mr. Watson, still with clammy face and trembling hands. "My G.o.d, I hope you will."
Mr. Burgoyne went upstairs. His wife was still asleep; and a prettier picture than she presented when asleep it would be hard to find. He put his hand upon her shoulder.
"Minnie!" No reply. "Minnie!" Still she slept.
When she did awake it was in the most natural and charming way conceivable. She stretched out her arms to her husband leaning over her.
"Charlie! Whatever is the time?"
"Where are those stones?"
"What?" With the back of her hands she began to rub her eyes. "Where are what?"
"Where are those stones?"
"I don"t know what--" yawn--"you mean."
"Minnie!--Don"t trifle with me!--Where have you put those diamonds?"
"Charlie! Whatever do you mean?"
Her eyes were wide open now. She lay looking at him in innocent surprise.
"What a consummate actress you are!"
The words came from his lips almost unawares. They seemed to startle her. "Charlie!"
He--loving her with all his heart--was unable to meet her glance, and began moving uneasily about the room, talking as he moved.
"Come, Minnie, tell me where they are?"
"Where what are?"
"The diamonds!"
"The diamonds! What diamonds? Whatever do you mean?"
"You know what I mean very well. I mean the Mit.w.a.terstraand diamonds which Watson showed us last night, and which you have taken from the case."
"Which I have taken from the case!" She rose from the bed, and stood on the floor in her night-dress, the embodiment of surprise. "If you will leave the room I shall be able to dress."
"Minnie! Do you really think I am a fool? I can make every allowance--G.o.d knows I have done so often enough before--but you must tell me where those stones are before I leave this room."
"Do you mean to suggest that I--I have stolen them?"
"Call it what you please! I am only asking you to tell me where you have put them. That is all."
"On what evidence do you suspect me of this monstrous crime?"
"Evidence? What do I need with evidence? Minnie, for G.o.d"s sake, don"t let us argue. You know that you are dearer to me than life, but this time--even at the sacrifice of life!--I cannot save you from the consequence of your own act."
"The consequence of my own act. What do you mean?"
"I mean this, that unless those diamonds are immediately forthcoming, this night you will sleep in jail."
"In jail! I sleep in jail! Is this some hideous dream?"
"Oh, my darling, for both our sakes tell me where the diamonds are."
"Charlie, I know no more where they are than the man in the moon."
"Then G.o.d help us, for we are lost!"
He ransacked every article of furniture the room contained. Tore open the mattresses, ripped up the boards, looked up the chimney. But there were no diamonds. And that night she slept in jail. Mr. Watson started off to tell his story to the meeting as best he might. Mr. and Mrs.
Burgoyne remained behind, searching for the missing stones. About one o"clock, Mr. Watson still being absent, a telegram was received at the local police station containing instructions to detain Mrs. Burgoyne on a charge of felony, "warrant coming down by train." Mr. Watson had evidently told his story to an unsympathetic audience. Mrs. Burgoyne was arrested and taken off to the local lock-up--all idea of bail being peremptorily pooh-poohed. Mr. Burgoyne tore up to town in a state of semi-madness. When Mr. Staunton heard the story, his affliction was at least, equal to his son-in-law"s. Dr. Muir was telegraphed for, and a hurried conference was held in the office of a famous criminal lawyer.
That gentleman told them plainly that at present nothing could be done.
"Even suppose the diamonds are immediately forthcoming, the case will have to go before a magistrate. You don"t suppose the police will allow you to compound a felony. That is what it amounts to, you know."
As for the medical point of view, it must be urged, of course; but the lawyer made no secret of his belief that if the medical point of view was all they had to depend on, the case would, of a certainty, be sent to trial.
"But it seems to me that at present there is not a t.i.ttle of evidence.
Your wife, Mr. Burgoyne, has been arrested, I won"t say upon your information, but on the strength of words which you allowed to escape your lips. But they can"t put you in the box; you could prove nothing if they did. When the case comes on they"ll ask for a remand. Probably they"ll get it, one remand at any rate. I shall offer bail, which they"ll accept. When the case comes on again, unless they have something to go on, which they haven"t now, it will be dismissed. Mrs.
Burgoyne will leave the court without a stain upon her character. We shan"t even have to hint at kleptomania, or klepto anything."
More than once that night Mr. Burgoyne meditated suicide. All was over.
She--his beloved!--through his folly--slept in jail. And if, by the skin of her teeth, she escaped this time, how would it be the next? She was guilty now--they might prove it then! And when he thought of the numerous precautions he had hedged her round with heretofore, it seemed marvellous that she had gone scot free so long. And suppose she had been taken at the outset of her career--in the affair of the jewels at the Grand Hotel--what would have availed any plea he might have urged before a French tribunal? He shuddered as he thought of it.
He never attempted to go to bed. He paced to and fro in his study like a caged wild animal. If he might only have shared her cell! The study was on the ground floor. It opened on to the garden. Between two and three in the morning he thought he heard a tapping at the pane. With a trembling hand he unlatched the window. A man stood without.
"Watson!"
As the name broke from him Mr. Watson staggered, rather than walked, into the room.
"I--I saw the light outside. I thought I had better knock at the window than disturb the house."
He sank into a chair, putting his arms upon the table, pillowing his face upon his hands. There was silence. Mr. Burgoyne, in his surprise, was momentarily struck dumb. At last, finding his voice, and eyeing his friend, he said--
"This is a bad job for both of us."
Mr. Watson looked up. Mr. Burgoyne, in spite of his own burden which he had to bear, was startled by something which he saw written on his face.
"As you say, it is a bad job for both of us." Mr. Watson rose as he was speaking. "But it is worst for me. Why did you tell me all that stuff about your wife?"