"So you know about the key?" she said sullenly. And about the table ran
a little quiver of relief. With that question, Jenny Prask had delivered
herself into their hands.

"Yes."

Jenny stood with a mutinous face and silent lips. Lady Splay had
marshalled in their order the items of the case which would be made
against her, if she persisted in her lie. How would she receive them?
Persist, reckless of her own overthrow, so long as she overthrew Joan
Whitworth too? Or surrender angrily? The four people watched for her
answer with anxiety; and it was given in a way which they least
expected. For Jenny covered her face with her hands, her shoulders began
to heave and great tears burst out between her fingers and trickled down
the backs of her hands.

"It's unbearable," she sobbed. "I would have given my life for
her--that's the truth. Oh, I know that most maids serve their mistresses
for what they can get out of them. But she was so kind to me--wherever
she went she was thoughtful of my comfort. Oh, if I had guessed what she
meant to do! And I might have!"

The truth came out now. Stella Croyle had given the letter to Jenny, and
Jenny herself had taken it to the garage and sent the chauffeur off upon
his journey. She had no idea of what the letter contained. Stella was in
the habit of inhaling chloroform; she carried a bottle of it in her
dressing-case--a bottle which Jenny had taken secretly from the room and
smashed into atoms after Doctor McKerrel's departure. She had already
conceived her plan to involve Joan in so much suspicion that she must
needs openly confess that she had returned from Harrel to meet Mario
Escobar in the empty house.

"Mario Escobar!" Millie Splay exclaimed. "It was he." She turned pale.
Sir Charles Hardiman had spoken frankly to her of Escobar. A creature of
the shadows--it was rumored that he lived on the blackmailing of women.
Joan was not out of the wood then! Martin Hillyard was quick to appease
her fears.

"He will not trouble you," and when Jenny had gone from the room he
added, "Mario Escobar was arrested this morning. He will be interned
till the end of the war and deported afterwards."

Lady Splay rose, her face bright with relief.

"Thank you," she said warmly to Hillyard. "I am going up to Joan." At
the door she stopped to add, "Now that it's over, I don't mind telling
you that I admire Jenny Prask. Out-and-out loyalty like hers is not so
common that we can think lightly of