e's out of the way, there's no come-back,' the voice snarled. 'I
won't listen to anything else! Do you hear! Why, you fool, what are you
trying to do--hand me one! Turn everything into cash, and divvy, and
beat it--eh? And I'm the goat, and I get caught and get twenty years
for stealing trust funds--and the rest of you get the coin!' He swore
terribly again. 'Who's taken the risk in this for the last five years!
There'll be no smart Aleck lawyer tricks--there'll be no halfway
measures! And who are you to dictate! She goes out--that's safe--I
inherit as next of kin, with no one to dispute it, and that's all there
is to it!'

"I stood there and could not move. It was the voice of the man I knew
as my uncle! My heart seemed to have stopped beating. I tried to tell
myself that I was dreaming, that it was too horrible, too incredible to
be real; that they could not really mean to--to MURDER me. And then I
recognised Hilton Travers' voice.

"'I am not dictating, and you are not serious, of course,' he said,
with what seemed an uneasy laugh. 'I am only warning you that you are
forgetting to take the real Henry LaSalle into account. He is bound to
hear of this eventually, and then--'

"Another voice broke in--one I did not recognise.

"'You're talking too loud, both of you! Travers doesn't understand, but
he's to be wised up to-night, according to orders, and--'

"The voice became inaudible, muffled--I could not hear any more. I
suppose I remained there another three or four minutes, too stunned to
know what to do; and then I ran softly along the hall to the library
door. The library, you understand, was at the rear of the room they
were in, and the two rooms were really one; that is, there was only an
archway between them. I cannot tell you what my emotions were--I do not
know. I only know that I kept repeating to myself, 'they are going to
kill me, they are going to kill me!' and that it seemed I must try and
find out everything, everything I could."

She turned away from the table, and began to pace nervously up and down
the miserable room.

Jimmie Dale rose impulsively from his chair--but she waved him back
again.

"No; wait!" she said. "Let me finish. I crept into the library. It took
me a long time, because I had to be so careful not to make the slightest
noise. I suppose it was fully six or seven minutes from the time I
had first heard my supposed uncle's voice until I had crept far enough
forward to be able to