lighter!" Then, all in a moment, he was fighting and twisting and
doubling to regain his hold upon the man who was trying to escape; there
was a muttered curse, and a flying foot came out and caught the leg of a
delicate table, sending it toppling over with a crash in the midst of
them; the grating of a key in a lock, and--the end had come!

Brushing a piece of dust from his sleeve as P. C. Mackay snapped the
bracelets upon still another prisoner, Cleek turned and surveyed the
room with flushed cheek and flashing eye.

"Friends," he said blandly, "your man--your murderer. Caught as
red-handed as one could wish--and as innocently as a babe, too!"

And pointed toward the manacled, fighting figure of James Tavish!

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE SECRET OF THE SINGING WHEEL

The scene that followed this startling announcement can well be imagined
rather than described. For even as the man stood glowering at them, his
mouth muttering the curses that his heart held, came a new diversion
from another quarter. For Catherine Dowd had called out sharply, "Quick!
quick! some smelling-salts here--and brandy!" and as the women of the
party endeavoured to produce one item, while the men more successfully
produced the other, it was seen that Johanna McCall was the object of
this aid, for she half-lay, half-sprawled upon the floor, mouth open,
face twitching, eyes already glazing over, and the white froth forming
about her pale lips.

Cleek leaned down and lifted her head in his uninjured arm; and looked
down into her upthrown ghastly face.

"Gad!" he said under his breath, "and now the other one--self-confessed!
Who'd have thought it?--who, indeed? And for what reason, I wonder?"

"For him--for Ross--for the man I love," the pale lips framed the words
brokenly as the strength of the girl sagged and ebbed slowly away. "He
would have disinherited him--disinherited Ross, turned him
out--penniless! Cruel--wicked--I stabbed him with--the stiletto--the
light went out--caught it off the table--wiped it on _her_ dress--must
have been mad--mad--but you can't get me. It's poison--arsenic. I had it
ready. And I needn't have done it--after all!"

Then she sighed a little, opened her eyes suddenly and closed them
again, and then slumped forward in Cleek's arms--dead.

Cleek caught at a cushion, pushed it under the sagging head, slipped his
own arm out from under it, and got slowly to his feet. His face was
pale, his lips set.

"Ladies a