ive Sinclair would not be missed.
She had given up her rooms to leave for England that night. In a bag
hanging from her belt were her tickets for train and boat. We were of
much the same figure. Loria, in speaking to me of her before, had
mentioned this slight resemblance. Her hair was brown, while mine was
red-gold. Hers would have to be bleached, now that she lay dead. But
there was no great difficulty in that, for I had the stuff in the house,
as I used it in very small quantities to give extra brightness to mine.

"While I had been gone Loria had fired shot after shot into the poor dead
face, from a revolver, which he did not show me. Afterward, when I was
far away, I heard that the weapon was Maxime's; but, honestly, I did not
think at the time that Maxime would be implicated in this affair. I was
half mad. I thought only of myself, and of Loria's self-sacrifice.
Already I could have worshipped him for what he was doing to save me.

"He shot the hands, too, that they might be shattered, for Olive
Sinclair's hands were not like mine; but before he did that, he had
slipped two or three of my rings, which he had found on my
dressing-table, upon the dead fingers.

"All this was finished when I dragged myself home. But together we
bleached the dark hair till it was the colour of mine, and together we
dressed the body in my clothes, Loria having removed the gown before he
used the revolver. Oh, the horror of that scene! It is part of my
punishment that I live it over often at night. At last we arranged the
shattered hands to look as if the girl had flung them up to protect her
face from the murderer.

"I put on her travelling dress, and her hat, with a thick veil of my own.
Meanwhile, a knock had come at the door. I feared that the shots had been
heard, and that we would be arrested. But Loria quieted me. He said the
revolver was small, and had made scarcely any sound; that, as no one
lived in the flat above or just underneath, it was quite safe. We did not
answer the knock, though it came again and again. But afterward, in the
letter-box on the door, there was a packet containing the money which
Maxime had got from the pawnbroker for my jewels. That I took with me,
and Loria gave me more. Whether Maxime himself brought the money, or sent
it by messenger, I did not know; but, afterward, the _concierge_ bore
witness that he had passed into the house before the murder must have
taken place, and gone out long afterward.