The discovery by the Burmese that the soap contained merely the paste replica, made them suspect Burke of duplicity. Hence, after Fanshawe and I lost them Friday morning, the Burman had continued to dog the ex-secretary until relieved some time during the day by the misshapen dwarf, who, in turn, had followed him to the Page place after nightfall.

The mute—whose ugly visage Genevieve had seen at the alcove curtains—had attacked him, perhaps in the belief that Burke had found the gem, and that he had been deceiving them respecting it.

It was this struggle in the bedroom which had created such a tumult, frightening Burke within an inch of his life, and driving him pellmell away and to his bed, where he had remained until the following Tuesday. Both had utterly vanished by the time I effected an entrance to the house.

"I can truthfully say, Burke," I confided, "that I never underestimated your intelligence. You did not go blindly to the Page place Friday night. You reasoned that, if Mr. Page displayed the genuine ruby to Maillot, and if the jewel-case contained only the replica when you robbed the safe an hour or so later, why, the substitution must have occurred somewhere between the library table, where Maillot and Page had been sitting, and the safe. Consequently you were encouraged by the assurance that the scope of your search would be restricted.

"I believe you argued correctly. And to keep you out of further mischief, or from setting your precious Burmese upon me again, why, you may stay here a while and think over it."

Despite his protestations, when I left headquarters the last glimpse I had of him was through the bars of a cell door.

I went directly to the Fluette residence to inform Genevieve that her apprehensions and uncertainties had at last crystallized into dread reality. I shall not dwell upon this wretched conference; it is quite enough to say that the poor girl was torn with grief, yet not wholly convinced.

"Knowles,"—she was clinging to my arm, her voice hoarse and distressed,—"it is too terrible—too monstrous for belief. I can not do it—can't believe it—unless I hear the words from Uncle Alfred's own lips. He is here now; he did n't go down-town to-day. The horrible charge has been made—confront him with it. He's up-stairs with Aunt Clara."

"Very well," I quietly returned. "You go and ask him, as calmly as possible, to come down to his study. Don't alarm Miss Belle or her mother; it may not be necessary."

Moving blindly toward the stairs, she paused on the first landing and turned to me a tragic face.

"Courage!" I whispered.

Then she found the strength to carry her on to the end of her revulsive errand. I went direct to the study, and waited.

Fluette came in hastily, his manner wild, his face white and haggard. Genevieve, distressed and heart-broken, followed close behind him. She closed the door. The man began speaking at once, incoherently, in a harsh, strident whisper that signified constricted throat muscles.

"So! It's come at last! You—keep it from—from—my God! keep it from my wife and daughter!"

I answered him roughly, in an attempt to keep him from breaking completely down.

"Pull yourself together, man! What sort of way is this to act?" I surveyed his abject figure an instant, then added with some bitterness: "It is not I that you fear, but your own conscience."

I was thinking of the women.

He slumped into a chair, clasped his out-stretched hands upon the writing-table, and allowed his head to droop between his arms. At that moment I heard Belle calling "Papa!" She was running lightly down the stairs. Again she called, and I knew that she was coming swiftly toward the library.

Genevieve made a move as if to bolt the door, but I checked her with a gesture. Of what use would it be to bar the way of her who came so impulsively? The dreadful truth must be broken to her. It was a task that no third person might assume; let her hear it wrung from her father's unwilling lips.

"Papa!" She was approaching quickly. How youthful and self-reliant her voice sounded! The sweet, girlish contralto jarred painfully upon at least two of our tense, waiting group. And Belle continued to advance all unsuspectingly.

"Papa, where are you? Why don't you answer?"

Genevieve ran over to her uncle, and laid one arm across his bowed shoulders.

"Uncle! Uncle!" She shook him, striving in an agitated way to rouse him to a sense of realization. "Uncle! Sit up! Don't go all to pieces, this way! Belle is at the door!"



And sure enough, as the bent figure painfully straightened a light rap sounded upon the panel, and Belle's fresh young voice again called:

"Are you in there, papa? May I come in?"

Genevieve drew suddenly back to a shadowed corner, wringing her hands with a helpless, despairing gesture. Fluette rose unsteadily to his feet. Then the door opened, and Belle stood framed in the doorway.

The man's look darted feverishly between the two girls—Genevieve well-nigh overcome, while the smile on Belle's handsome face quickly gave way to an expression of bewilderment, and then to a dawning one of alarm. Next she rushed into the room, and stopped abruptly. Bending a look of anxious inquiry first upon her cousin and then upon me, she finally confronted her father.

"Papa," she faltered, her voice quaking with the fear that suddenly gripped her heart, "what is it? What does this mean?" Then, as she started blindly toward him, she uttered one piercing, agonizing cry: "Papa!"

Unconsciously he brushed aside her beseeching arms. He did not answer her directly; his words were a response to the charge that I had not yet made.

"Man, you are right," he said huskily, "it is my conscience. It is not you that accuse me, but the pure eyes of these two innocent girls—the unspoken reproach of that broken, white-haired woman who sits in silence up-stairs—those fling the charge into my face—sear it into my very soul—every minute of the day and night.

"Take me. I am guilty. It was I who killed Felix Page."



CHAPTER XXV

"THIMBLE, THIMBLE——"

It is needless to dwell upon the scene in Alfred Fluette's study; I shall take up merely such details as constitute an integral part of this memoir, and hurry along.

After Genevieve had led Belle away, Mr. Fluette quickly mastered himself. The bitter moment of the confession once passed, it seemed as if his mind had been relieved of a great burden, and he talked to me with comparative unreserve. But his appearance was in pitiable contrast with what it must have been before he wandered into devious ways. He was crushed, his mien one of hopeless submission to whatever the future might have in store for him.

"First of all," he began, with impressive earnestness, "I want to emphasize the fact that when I snuffed out that man's life I was in imminent peril of my own. When I snatched up the candlestick, if ever a man had murder in his heart Felix Page had at that moment.

"The rest was automatic; I could no more have stayed the deadly blow than I can now hope to escape its consequences. Revolt from almost a lifetime of pitiless, persistent persecution filled me with an irresistible impulse to destroy and rendered my arm invincible."

I went with him, step by step, over the ground that is already familiar. Felix Page had ever been the thorn in his flesh.

"It wasn't as if I had a tangible enemy," he declared; "he would n't come out into the open and fight. His aims were always petty, he perpetually annoyed and harassed me by mean and ignoble ways, which I was obliged to bear with an assumption of ignoring them, or else lower myself to his level to meet them. Any bold, decisive stroke would at least have won my respect; but no, the cunning hound knew that my disposition could not forever turn aside his sly thrusts; he knew that, by degrees but inevitably, he was warping my nature, slowly but surely destroying all that was best in me.

"Well," bitterly, "he has succeeded. He has ruined me not only financially, but body and soul as well.

"Time and time again he flaunted in my face some old letters which my wife wrote when she was a mere girl. They were such as any artless, inexperienced girl might write to a man who has for the moment captured her fancy; but how could that be made clear to a public ever greedy for scandal? How would those letters read in the light of my wife's years and the dignity of her present position? Yet the scoundrel has threatened me times without number that he would scatter them broadcast.

"Then—the ruby: that was a crowning stroke. He deliberately stepped in and wrested it from my grasp simply because he in some way found out that I had set my heart upon it for my collection. It was as if he perpetually had his fingers upon the pulse of my desires and intentions; he seemed to divine and anticipate my every move.

"But I was soon reconciled to the stone's loss, and I would have remained so had it not been for that creature, Burke. When he put the idea into my mind that perhaps Page had no legal title to it, I was tempted—and I fell. He presented to me too good an opportunity to retaliate for me to let it pass.

"It was a foolish thing for me to do, going to his house that fatal Tuesday night; but there was no other way. Burke was willing to procure the stone from its hiding-place, but flatly refused to assume the risk of conveying it through the streets. Page was to be away from town that night, so in an evil moment I decided to take the chance.

"You know what happened. I failed to get the gem that night; your unrelaxing vigilance prevented Burke from getting at where he supposed he had hidden it, and at last the Burmese determined to make the attempt Thursday night. Friday morning I was to have again met Tshen-byo-yen to close the deal for the stone, when one of his henchmen notified Burke and me that the attempt had been a failure, that they had succeeded in securing only the replica. We both charged Burke with double-dealing."

I started suddenly at his last words; a possibility had flashed into my mind, so huge and significant that I could comprehend it only by degrees. I spoke with quick eagerness.

"Mr. Fluette, do you think the Burmese would have devoted all these years to recovering the jewel, if they were willing to sell it to the first would-be purchaser that happened along? Doesn't that strike you as a bit peculiar?—as being inconsistent with their unflagging zeal, their tireless efforts to regain what they contend was once stolen from them? Those fellows are very far from home, please bear in mind."

"I never before regarded it in that light," he thoughtfully returned.

He was not interested, and did not press me for an explanation. But his suggestion of Burke's double-dealing had given me an idea which was clearing away one dark corner of the puzzle: the possibility was opening up more rapidly. I looked at him shrewdly.

"Just how did Maillot's story of his experience with Page impress you?" I asked.

He gave me a quick glance.

"It was amazing. I could not believe that Maillot was wilfully fabricating; yet, to accept his extraordinary story left me, as the only alternative, a conviction that Felix Page had either undergone a change of heart, or else had lost his mind."

"It did n't occur to you that Page might be trying a game of his own?"

"No."

"Did you ever see the replica?" I asked.

"Yes, many times. It is a remarkably excellent imitation—silicate of alumina; the weight, color, and hardness, the measurements—table, girdle, and culasse—all correspond exactly with the original. It lacks only in density, and perhaps a trifle in—but no; it would require an expert test to determine that it was not a true ruby."

"Then," I eagerly pursued, "even an expert might be imposed upon by the replica?"

"Well," he slowly admitted, "perhaps—yes. But not for long; men who deal in precious stones after a time develop a sort of sixth sense that protects them against imposition. It is too subtle to define; but any diamond merchant will tell you that the most perfect imitation will raise a doubt in his mind as to its genuineness; a true stone, never."

When I considered his special knowledge of the subject in general, and of the Paternoster ruby in particular, I was astounded at his obtuseness. Later, I was no less astounded at my own.

"Is it possible, Mr. Fluette," I went on, with an enthusiasm which he did not in the least share, "that it never occurred to you what Burke's game might be? With the connivance of these Burmese, he was deliberately attempting to swindle you; he meant to practise the old familiar game of 'switching' the false for the real stone. The Burmese want the stone, not the money without the stone; but for a generous share in the proceeds, they were willing to lend themselves to Burke's fraud. There 's the Oriental for you."

The man stared at me dully. I continued, warming with the subject.

"And Felix Page—he was craftier than even you give him credit for. Mr. Fluette, there 's nothing extraordinary in Maillot's story of his Tuesday night adventure—except our stupidity in comprehending its real significance.

"Remember Page's strict injunction to Maillot not to let the jewel-case out of his possession until he and Miss Belle were married; think of the alacrity with which he acceded to Maillot's request; think of his sly chuckles and furtive manner, of his attitude during the whole of that remarkable conference, and tell me what it means if he, too, didn't intend palming off the false stone on you? Maillot and Miss Belle once married, then the young man—in complete innocence, to be sure—would have handed you, not the ruby, but—the replica."

Slowly the dull look died out in Alfred Fluette's eyes, and in spite of his distress, his face flushed darkly with anger.

"The hound!" he muttered through his clenched teeth. "What a dupe I 've been. But," he added, with kindling interest, "where is the ruby, then?"

"Ah, precisely. That's what I would like to know myself. I think, however, I have the key that will unlock its hiding-place, when I learn how to use it." And I showed him the cipher. He shook his head over it; it was utterly meaningless to him.

There was one phase of our conference concerning which I insisted that the wretched man be minutely circumstantial. Our talk touching upon this point was much too painful for me to reproduce here in its entirety; but after I had almost literally dragged from him every minute detail of the actual tragedy, I felt justified in offering a word of encouragement.

It is sufficient simply to record now the point brought out, to supplement it with certain details acquired from Burke, and to state that it had a vital bearing upon the outcome of the case. The Page affair was by no means closed yet.

When Mr. Fluette struck the blow with the candlestick he was standing at the angle of the balustrade nearest the rooms which Burke and Maillot were occupying. Mr. Page was facing in that direction—that is, toward the west—and consequently his left side was opposed to the balustrade. Such were the respective positions of the two men at the instant the candlestick was snatched from the floor.

Immediately after the blow was struck both Burke and Fluette were thrown into a panic. The latter at once ran wildly down the front stairs, stumbling over the body on the landing, and out at the front door and away. Burke followed hastily after him, his teeth chattering with fright, and promptly bolted the front door. The act was accomplished so soon after the flight that Fluette, overcome with horror at his deed, distinctly heard the bolt shoot while he was speeding down the walk.

Burke had already informed me that after he made fast the front door he ran back to the rear stairs—he was afraid to pass again the body on the landing—where he observed the rear door wide-open. This he also closed and locked, then hurried up to the second floor, being governed by only one idea—to secure, as quickly as he possibly could, Maillot's companionship.

Between the instant he started to follow Fluette down-stairs and the time he stood rapping at Maillot's door, he had consumed much less than a minute. Some time later he thought of the Burmese, but when he looked into his room it was empty. The open back door accounted for their absence.

When I departed from Alfred Fluette—and I did that very thing; walked deliberately away from him, leaving him hopeful in the midst of his household—my heart was exultant, although I had in contemplation a task that might have dismayed Hercules.

But sometimes, usually when we are least expecting it, or when we are getting our affairs into too much of a muddle. Providence intervenes, and with a decisive stroke straightens matters out for us. After all, it is ridiculous wasting so much time and energy in rough-hewing our ends, when the shaping lies with other hands than ours. On this day of days Providence appeared in the guise of Dr. Wentworth De Breen.

His buggy drew up at the curb beside me.

"Hullo!" was his gruff salutation.

I was pleased at the meeting.

"The very man I was wanting to see," said I. "How many hospitals are there in the city and the immediate vicinity?"

He eyed me in his customary serious, intent manner. I amplified:

"I have n't the least idea, you know. Perhaps I could name a dozen, perhaps a score; but there might be five hundred. Anyhow, I have to search them all—or, until I find what I want."

"The deuce you have!" he jerked out. "Anything to do with your ruby case?"

"Everything," said I.

"Well!" He stared at me a moment, then with a sudden movement whipped the fur lap-robe aside. "Get in here," he commanded, in his abrupt manner.

The next instant I was seated beside him, and his spirited mare was dashing along the street at a pace which I regarded as altogether too reckless. Dr. De Breen had a weakness for spirited horses, and he handled them with a careless ease that never failed to excite in me a secret envy; for—I here confess it—I always have been a bit afraid of horses, whether spirited or not; not much, but just enough to make me cautious. I never take any liberties with even a blind and spavined derelict.

"What d'ye want to find?" he bluntly asked, after we had ridden the better part of five minutes in silence.

"A disabled Burmese," was the reply. "I trust to find some part of his upper-works in a more or less damaged condition."

"Burmese!" he echoed in an exclamation. "Good. I win. Larrimer bet me a five he was a Javanese." The doctor sniffed scornfully, "Devilish lot Larrimer knows about ethnology." He then became lucid.

"Larrimer's head at the Drevel Hospital, y' know; deuced clever at the operating-table, but set in his ideas. Lord, dynamite would n't move him; stubborn's no name for it.

"Your Burmese is there: triple fracture of the left parietal, left clavicle and bladebone badly crushed; trephined him last night. Beggar 'll die."

"It certainly sounds serious enough," commented I. "Is the parietal a part of his upper-works?"

He jabbed with the tip of one gloved finger the side of my head nearest him, which happened to be the right.

"That's your right parietal," he explained; "the left one 's on the other side."

"Thank Heaven for sending you across my path this day!"—fervently. "That's my man."

The doctor was a good deal of a scoffer. "Heaven had nothing to do with it," said he, with unnecessary asperity. "I knew you 'd be wanting to see him; I was hunting for you. Beggar speaks English fairly well, and he let out a word or two that made me think he knew something you ought to know. . . . Whoa! Jump out!"

We entered the hospital, and soon were at the bedside of the dying man. The operation had relieved the brain from the pressure of the fractured skull, and the man's wanderings were interspersed with rational periods, during which his story was taken down in shorthand, with infinite difficulty, by the hospital's stenographer. I have taken the liberty of preparing a summary from the long rambling account, sufficient to show my justification for anticipating that the case was on the eve of taking an unexpected turn, and to satisfy the curious respecting certain aspects of the ruby's history.

The man, whose name was Chaya, was a priest of the temple at Tounghain, Upper Burma, "where the sublime Da-Fou-Jan sits in eternal meditation among the thousand caverns that lie beyond Mandalay." His companions were also priests, and Tshen-byo-yen was a wealthy noble of the district, whose family was accountable to the king for the safeguarding of the temple's sacred relic—the "Heart of Budda." Thus was the great ruby known, and the rich crimson jewel was averred by tradition to be nothing less holy than the actual blood of "the Perfectly Enlightened One," bestowed upon mankind in an imperishable form.

Naturally, the gem was greatly venerated and not to be profaned by impious hands. But in the time of Tshen's father, it was stolen from the temple by an English adventurer, who succeeded in escaping out of the country with it and making his way to London.

However, a curse went with the ruby. In the temple its influence was beneficent, its crimson glow benignant and abounding with blessings for all true believers; but when desecrated by the plundering vandal's touch it became a great power for evil.

Therefore it came to pass that by the time the reckless Englishman set foot upon his native soil he was only too glad to part with his ill-gotten treasure at almost any price. He was in rags, starving and broken in health.

Thus it was that the rough, uncut gem passed into the possession of Luca Paternostro.

The recovery of the Heart of Budda straightway became a sacred charge upon all the priests. Tshen's father devoted his entire fortune to the cause. With infinite patience, laboring tirelessly, the Burmese never lost sight of their precious relic; but in England they soon found that conditions were vastly different from those of their home country. It was impossible to approach the object which they coveted; and their opinion of legal redress was based upon their familiarity with what passed for justice in Burma. But they never grew disheartened; and at last their opportunity came.

It was Tshen's father who slew Paternostro. It was he who won undying honor by recovering the jewel. It was he who, hard-pressed by the police, was obliged to seek the nearest sanctuary, which happened to be France. The rest we know.

But the gem still carried its baleful spell, for we also know how the expert whom the Paternostros carried with them to Paris, was drowned just as the homeward-bound vessel was entering Dover harbor.

So much for the ruby's eventful history.

Chaya's declaration also confirmed my conclusions respecting Burke's designed imposition upon Alfred Fluette—which, by the way, he seemed to regard as perfectly legitimate. And then it concluded with the most important matter of all.

On the night of Felix Page's murder, while his companions were all in the second story, Chaya had remained on guard below. He had watched Page following Burke up-stairs, after the robbery, but could not warn the thief without alarming the pursuer.

After the struggle began in the hall, Chaya harkened to it a while, then dashed up the rear stairs to take a hand, in case the jewel was to be snatched from his companions at the very moment of victory. He passed through the bath room during the brief period Burke was in his own room informing Tshen of the state of affairs, entered the hall, where, by the dim light of the solitary candle, the two men were locked in combat. The struggle was so furious that his presence was not noticed. He proceeded to the north-east angle of the balustrade, where he crouched around the corner and followed through the balusters the uncertain issues of the fight.

He watched the two chief actors so intently, in fact, that he failed to perceive Burke snatch up the supposed ruby from the floor; but he did see Page wrest the leather case from Fluette.

Now was the time for him to act. He was armed with a black-jack—a ball of lead wrapped in leather and with a short, flexible leather handle—and just as Fluette grabbed up the iron candle-stick he plunged forward.

At this instant the light was extinguished, and he received the full weight of a human body as it staggered backward. He supposed it to be Page's. He struck out blindly with his own cruel weapon, at the same time shoving the body away from him. He felt his bludgeon crush upon his victim's head; and then he was himself felled to the floor with a tremendous blow that blotted out everything else for him. The base of the candlestick had found a mark wholly unsuspected by any one.

He knew afterwards that his companions had carried him down the rear stairs and away; that they tried to doctor him until they grew alarmed at the seriousness of his injuries; whereupon they deserted him in his room, after notifying the landlord, who had in turn notified the hospital authorities. Chaya was well supplied with funds, so there had been no difficulty on that score.

And thus was my deduction proved to be correct. Felix Page's left side had been toward the balustrade at the instant Fluette snatched up the candle-stick; on the balustrade was a deep indentation where the base of the improvised weapon had impinged, after glancing; and the fatal blow had struck upon the victim's right temple. A single descending blow can not very well pass down one side of a man and end upon the other.

But while Chaya's story gratified me beyond measure, at the same time it was incomplete; it threw no light upon the ruby's resting-place, and for the simple reason that he knew no more about it than any of the rest of the individuals interested in discovering where it had been hidden. I was satisfied that the cipher, once I had interpreted it, would lead me to the gem. Therefore, it remained for me to find it.

Well, the cryptic writing was solved, pretty soon; but the solution came like a crash of thunder, revealing the one twist toward the end that I had least expected.

And, worst of all, I should have known!



CHAPTER XXVI

THE CIPHER SOLVED

Chaya's ante-mortem statement, properly attested by Dr. Larrimer, Dr. De Breen, the hospital secretary, and myself, together with the otherwise complete case I had, was sufficient of course to open the prison doors for Royal Maillot. It should also have lifted the cloud from Alfred Fluette; but, alas! it did not.

To make my story end as all well-conditioned stories ought to end, I should here be able to wave my wand, or invoke some good genie, or however it is that the writer-folk bestow happiness at a stroke upon the helpless creatures whom they have been ruthlessly dragging through a sea of trial and tribulation, and show you the actors in my own drama transported with joy. But I am recording what actually happened. It was a strange fatality that cast itself into the lives of these people. They were dismayed, overwhelmed, rendered helpless, left uncomprehending. However much I may desire to do so, therefore, I can not twist the truth to give my own story precisely the ending that you or I might desire it to have.

As for myself, I couldn't carry the news fast enough to Maillot and to Mr. Fluette, and to Belle and Genevieve. My enthusiasm met its first damper when the cell door swung open, and the young fellow walked out a free man. It is true that his gratitude was immeasurable; he could find no words to express it, and he wrung my hand until—strong man that I am—I had to tear away from him.

But after his elation had time to cool, he grew morose and gloomy; he was more inclined to cling to what he had gone through, than to accept the extremely satisfactory assurance that he stood clear and as far above suspicion as Caesar's wife.

"No use talking, Swift," he responded to my attempts to rally him out of his humor; "the taint will stick to me. People will say I 'm the fellow who was arrested for killing his uncle so that he could inherit his fortune. They 'll always point me out and shake their heads and say I was released only because the police couldn't find evidence to convict me. I hope to Heaven the old man made a will giving all his money to charity."

"Faugh!" Such morbid talk was thoroughly exasperating. "Mr. Fluette had a much narrower escape than you did."

"Perhaps," he admitted heavily. "But nobody knows it outside of you and his family. I can't go to Belle with the odor of prison clinging to me. And what's more, I sha'n't."

"If you don't," I said quietly, "you 'll break her heart. Your suffering has been as nothing compared with hers." Then I lost my patience completely. "Maillot," I flung at him, "you're a damned fool!" And I swung on my heel and strode away.

"Hi! Swift! Come back here!" he yelled after me. In the next second he had caught hold of my arm and jerked me to a standstill.

"Good Lord, man! I did n't know you had such a nasty temper! Here you come and drag me out of jail, telling me I 'm innocent and all that sort of thing, and because I don't strike out hot-footed and throw myself into the presence of the cleanest, sweetest girl in the world, you think I 'm an ass.

"Look here. I knew I was innocent; but at the same time I did n't try to blink my compromising predicament. I wouldn't blame any fair-minded person for being suspicious of me. But everything 's happened so sudden—I can't understand,—and—well, hang it, Swift! you have n't made yourself clear, by a long shot. If you think I ought to go to Belle, why, I 'll go."

"Then let's go together," said I.

And we did.

After we had boarded a car, I reverted to the matter of the will.

"I don't think it's likely that any will will turn up," I told him. "I have talked with Mr. Ulysses White about it, and he said that Felix Page was one of the sort who have a holy horror of last testaments. If the old gentleman ever made any such disposition of his property, Mr. White had no hand in it."

To dismiss the matter, I will say here that no will ever did turn up, and that Maillot inherited the entire Page fortune. I merely mentioned this topic to pave the way for that of the ruby.

"Not the least part of the estate," I pursued, "will be the Paternoster ruby."

The young fellow interrupted me impulsively.

"By George, Swift! it's yours. Find it and keep it—or sell it and keep the money. I 'll not have the ghastly thing—chuck it into the lake first."

"That's no proper way to dispose of it; and later on you might regret such a gift to me. This was what I was going to suggest.

"I believe the claim of the Burmese to be just, for I suppose they 're honest according to their lights. They would have a pretty hard time establishing it, though, if you are of a mind to contest the matter."

"Great Scott! Forget that cursed ruby; talk about something else. I want to get the thing out of my mind and never think of it again."

"All right. I sha'n't mention it after to-day. But let me get through. Here 's an easy way to settle the matter.

"Let the Burmese have it after reimbursing the estate for what your uncle paid for it; it would be only fair—at least, in a measure.

"I want to hold Tshen and his entourage of mild-eyed cutthroats until I put Burke through; they 're my best witnesses. We can't hang the rascal, but we have an excellent ease against him for burglary, attempted swindling, and attempted blackmail. After I find the ruby you can do the bargaining."

He agreed to this. After a bit he favored me with a quizzical regard.

"I don't mind explaining that ring episode—now," he said, in response to my look of inquiry. "When you first pointed out the true import of the wax impression on the candlestick, it brought to my mind at once Fluette's capricious notion of wearing a ring on the middle finger of his right hand. I was keeping tab on you the day of the inquest. I knew that he was going to attend, and that the circumstance would be of considerable significance to you. I saw your look dart to his right hand—-saw you watching him—"

"And you thought you 'd confuse me, eh?"

"Exactly. When you saw the ring on his finger only, the circumstance was pregnant—portentous. When you had two rings on two right hands, why, you were puzzled, but the effect was scattering and weak."

I approached Mr. Fluette with an enthusiasm decidedly tempered, and so I was not as disappointed as I might have been. My good news seemed to produce not the slightest effect upon him. He appeared to have aged twenty years; and from that day until his death, which occurred only four months later, he remained melancholy and without interest in anything whatever.

However, I was placed in the most embarrassing position that I ever experienced in my life. Before explanations were half made, Miss Belle flew at me—I 'm not attempting a pun, either—with a glad, impetuous cry, threw her arms around my neck, and, drawing herself to her tiptoes—kissed me! I had been far more at ease under her levelled revolver.

In the afternoon Genevieve and I repaired to the old Page place. She was so confident that she could find the originals of the designs on the cipher, that I was anxious to give her the chance. Besides, she was afraid to go alone, and I simply had to accompany her. Belle could not without Maillot tagging along, and—well, we didn't want anybody else.

First of all, Genevieve had to be shown the dent made by the candlestick in the railing of the balustrade. She placed the tip of one little finger in the depression, and drew back with a shudder.

"Let's go," she said, in a hushed voice. "I never expect to come up these stairs again. Let's find the daisies, and go."

She understood as well as I did that Felix Page must have substituted the stones somewhere between the library table and the hidden safe in his bedroom. She proposed to start at the table and examine every object, if necessary, between the two points mentioned.

Our progress was slow until we reached the bedroom. Genevieve drew to an abrupt halt on the threshold.

"There was a table there, by the head of the bed," she said; "where is it?"

"Lying on its side in that corner"—I pointed. "It was hurled there last Friday night, when the dwarf surprised Burke here."

She went over to it, while I raised the blinds. Instantly she recoiled with a cry, and then in a flash was fairly wild with excitement.

"Knowles, Knowles!" she screamed. "Here they are!"

And sure enough, there they were—the brass tacks with which the artificial leather cover had been fastened on. Their heads were ornamental, with just such crenellated edges as might have prompted the circular figures at each end of the cipher.

I stared at them in stupefied silence. The row of gleaming tacks staggered me. How many times had I lingered by that very table while I racked my brain to remember where I had seen the peculiar figure! Why, once I even had paused and drawn the design in the dust on the leather cover! What a dunce—how blind I had been!

The cipher was not difficult to read now. At once I recalled Burke's shadow on the blind; he had been bending over this table, and the agile movements of his hands were no longer mysterious. He, too, had some knowledge of the cipher, and he had been rapidly running over the tack-heads, hunting for the combination that would reveal a concealed compartment.

After a while we grew rational again. I got out the cipher, and once more Genevieve and I put our heads together over it. Here it is; you may follow us while we dig it out:



"If you remember," I said presently, "I told you that very likely it would have to be interpreted in connection with something not on the paper. Count the tacks along the front edge."

There were nineteen of them.

"Counting from either end," I went on, "the centre tack will be ten. It 's as simple as A-B-C. That's our starting-point from which to find the others. Find the fourth one to the right of the centre tack—number ten."

She placed the tip of one forefinger upon it—a bit gingerly, I smiled to see.

"Why, it gives!" she announced in surprise.

"I 'd be terribly cut up if it did n't," said I. "Now, then, the eleventh to the right."

This carried her to the third one around the side; number thirteen was the fifth on the left side, number seventeen the ninth on the right side, while number five was on the front edge, of course, close to the centre. Each of them yielded a trifle beneath her pressure—until she came to number five. Here she drew back and clasped her hands tightly together.

"Oh, I can't!" she cried excitedly. "I'm just so nervous that I can't put my finger upon it. You do it."

"Nonsense!" said I. "If you don't find the ruby, it will never be found. That's the last one."

At last, with shining eyes and parted lips, the little finger went slowly down upon the fateful tack-head. She screwed up her eyes and closed her lips tightly, as if she feared something would explode, then pushed with all her might. The tack gave; but nothing else happened.

We stared at the table, our faces long with disappointment; then we looked at each other in unspoken questioning. Genevieve's expression was so woe-begone that I laughed. The nerve-racking suspense was broken.

"How silly!" she exclaimed. "There!"

With a quick movement, she bore down upon the centre tack—number ten—and lo! a section of the table edge flew outward, disclosing an aperture perhaps six inches long and a quarter of an inch wide. It was very much like a slit in a door for letters.

But there was no ruby yet, nor any aperture large enough to accommodate the one for which we were looking. I leaned over with a puzzled scowl and peered into the slit.

"There 's a folded paper in there," I announced. My fingers were too large to force into the opening, and Genevieve promptly produced a hat-pin. Next moment we had the paper out—or papers, for there were three sheets folded together.

Across the back, written in Felix Page's small cramped hand, was this inscription:

Memorandum of Agreement between Felix Page and Cristofano Paternostro, Michele Paternostro and Filippo Paternostro.

"Well, we 're hot on the scent, at any rate," was my comment, as I unfolded the papers. Then I quickly folded them again, without a glance inside.

"Wait!" said I. "This is a solemn occasion, and it should be recognized with some fitting observance."

"Oh, don't tease!" cried Genevieve, dancing up and down with impatience, and trying to pluck the papers from my hand.

"I 'm not teasing, my dear," said I; "I 'm terribly serious. We are pretty near the end of the trail, little girl; after we have read this imposing document we will have reached the end. I 'm halfway sorry, too, notwithstanding the grim tragedy that has hung over us. We must celebrate the last event with an appropriate rite—a fire upon the library hearth."

She flushed with delight, and consented to wait until I had the fire going properly. It was a most successful fire. We dragged the library table up close; I jumped Genevieve to a seat upon it, and then seated myself beside her. She placed a hand upon my shoulder, and our heads were again very close together.

"Now, then!" I shook the papers open.

The more imposing one—the agreement—I placed beneath; its dry legal phraseology was not at all inviting. The other sheets were, however. They too were written all over in Felix Page's hand, but bore the blunt, direct phrases of a man used to expressing himself without any rhetorical embellishment or nonsense.

And this is what we read:

This explanation is written to clear up any misunderstanding or doubt, that may arise after my death, over the stone called the Paternoster Ruby.

In June, 1884, I learned that Alfred Fluette was trying to buy it from the Paternostros. I at once determined that he should not have the stone if money could prevent it. So I too became a bidder.

The first figure set by the dealers was almost prohibitive, but as Fluette seemed willing to meet it, I was ready to go him one better. But the wily Italians hedged. They set us to bidding against each other, and as the price rose my resolution to get the stone grew more set.

While the bids mounted, I was given ample satisfaction for the weight of whatever financial obligations I was incurring by Fluette's increasing worry and chagrin. He was like a pup that does n't know whether the bone is going into the soup-kettle or the garbage-can. I swore to have that bit of red glass if it took every cent that I could rake and scrape together—and I had a few of them.

Finally Fluette drew out, cursing me. I brought the Italians to a showdown.

Still they hesitated. I became suspicious.

One night Cristofano Paternostro, the head of the firm, called at my hotel. He was nervous and ill at ease. He informed me, with many hems and haws, that the ruby Fluette and I had been snarling over was lying at the bottom of the English Channel, and that they would be unable to deliver the goods. He had a good deal to say about the prestige the ruby gave the firm, and much more to the same effect, until I cut him off short. I told him that the ruby was nearer to making him ridiculous.

It seems that after they recovered the stone in Paris, the expert who accompanied them could n't resist the temptation to steal it. Besides being a gem expert and an expert thief, this fellow was accounted an expert swimmer. When the boat was near land he tried to get away with the prize by jumping overboard, under cover of night, and swimming ashore. He did succeed in reaching the nearest land—which is to say, straight down. And that was the last of him, the ruby, and pretty nearly of the three Italians.

Since the ruby could n't be recovered, they agreed to make the best of it. They agreed to keep the matter among themselves, and to continue to reap all the advertising benefits which the supposed possession of such a costly trinket gave them.

It was a joke, that. Here was I, like an old idiot, trying to spend good money for something the other fellow did n't have to sell.

But pretty soon I saw a way to reach my end just the same as though I 'd beat Fluette in the deal. It was a whole lot better than that, in fact. I could get out from under without it costing me a cent, and still make Fluette and the world believe that I had bought the ruby.

"Nice thing for the Paternostros," says I, "when all this comes out."

Cristofano turned green. He begged me not to tell. He promised me the pick of his gems if I 'd only keep the secret.

I looked at him pretty sour. "Very well," says I at last. "You give me the imitation stone. I 'll never disclose the fact that you did n't have the original ruby, if you will announce to the world that it was sold to me for $500,000. As long as you keep your mouth shut, I 'll keep mine."

He was tickled to death. Nothing would do but he must have in the rest of the firm (his brother and cousin). When they came I had a written contract prepared for them, setting forth the terms of our agreement and binding them with a penalty heavy enough to keep them from blabbing. (Contract memo. attached hereto.)

How long we remained silent in the midst of a speechless wonder, I haven't the least idea. Words were wholly inadequate even feebly to express the mingled feelings with which we slowly digested the full force and import of this remarkable document.

So the very heart and essence of the tragedy, the crimson woof that knitted together the dark warp of its fabric, had all along been unreal and without substance! For a gem that can not be applied to its ordained function can scarcely be said to have an existence. Yet the Paternoster ruby had been potent to project its maleficent influence from the depths of its watery grave, and shape the destinies of the living. Verily, Fate never played a grimmer joke.

My thoughts drifted back to the night of the murder. Why had Felix Page paused beside the table while going between the hidden safe and Maillot, who was waiting in the library? I could imagine only one explanation: as he passed the table he was seized with a sudden impulse to impart the secret to the young man, even going to the extent of setting down the jewel-box so that one hand would be free to manipulate the tack-heads. But a second thought had prevailed. He picked up the box and proceeded on his way.

Genevieve, round-eyed, sat staring into the dying fire. (That was a jolly fire!) Presently her head bent over to my shoulder, and without looking up she quoted a familiar couplet which must have occurred to the reader ere this:

"Full many a gem of purest ray serene The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear."

I mention the circumstance because it prompted an idea which suddenly set me to laughing. Genevieve looked at me in alarm.

"What in the world!" she marvelled, for the silence had been very sedate.

"Little girl," I at last enlightened her, "it will pay you to go with me when we leave here—to the Central Station. There 's something I want us to enjoy together; it will compensate for a deal of your late trouble and anxiety."

"What is it?"

"I want to hand Alexander Burke these papers, tell him they 're what was hidden in the table—then quietly watch him while he reads."

I meant to do it, too. But Genevieve failed to enter into the spirit of the suggestion.

"Mercy!" she shuddered. "I don't want to gloat over the poor wretch."

I said no more about it, but—well, the result was all that I had anticipated.

Genevieve reminded me that we should be thankful for having been relieved from a final perplexity.

"I don't understand," said I.

"Why, we haven't the ruby to dispose of; that would have puzzled even you."

"I don't know about that. Royal gave it to me. I see where I stand to lose a fortune. Five hundred thousand—whew!"

Suddenly she snuggled closer and clasped her hands tightly upon my shoulder. Her hair teased my cheek, and the delicate perfume of it made me light-headed. Twisting her pretty head sideways, she flashed an arch look at me from under her lashes, then glanced quickly away again. Blue eyes and long dark lashes are a potently disturbing combination.

"Well," she sighed, "the Page case may have cost you a fortune, but—it gave you me. And I—for one—am very content and happy, Mr. Swift."



THE END