emperance missionary to equatorial Africa, and has the assurance to
add that he believes my daughter is not indisposed to accompany him!" His
consummating wrath acted as a momentary stimulant. He sat upright, his
eyes flashing and his brow thunderous. I felt for that chaplain. Then he
collapsed miserably. "The sapphires will have to be produced, identified,
revalued. How shall I come out of it? Think of the disgrace, the ripping
up of old scandals! Even if I were to compound with Lady Carwitchet, the
sum she hinted at was too monstrous. She wants more than my money. Help
me, Mr. Acton! For the sake of your own family interests, help me!"

"I beg your pardon--family interests? I don't understand."

"If my daughter is childless, her next of kin is poor Marmaduke Panton,
who is dying at Cannes, not married, or likely to marry; and failing him,
your nephew, Sir Thomas Acton, succeeds."

My nephew Tom! Leta, or Leta's baby, might come to be the possible
inheritor of the great Valdez sapphire! The blood rushed to my head as I
looked at the great shining swindle before me. "What diabolic jugglery was
at work when the exchange was made?" I demanded fiercely.

"It must have been on the last occasion of her wearing the sapphires in
London. I ought never to have let her out of my sight."

"You must put a stop to Miss Panton's marriage in the first place," I
pronounced as autocratically as he could have done himself.

"Not to be thought of," he admitted helplessly. "Mira has my force of
character. She knows her rights, and she will have her jewels. I want you
to take charge of the--thing for me. If it's in the house she'll make me
produce it. She'll inquire at the banker's. If _you_ have it we can gain
time, if but for a day or two." He broke off. Carriage wheels were
crashing on the gravel outside. We looked at one another in consternation.
Flight was imperative. I hurried him downstairs and out of the
conservatory just as the door bell rang. I think we both lost our heads in
the confusion. He shoved the case into my hands, and I pocketed it,
without a thought of the awful responsibility I was incurring, and saw him
disappear into the shelter of the friendly night.

When I think of what my feelings were that evening--of my murderous hatred
of that smirking, jesting Jezebel who sat opposite me at dinner, my
wrathful indignation at the thought of the poor little expected heir
defrauded ere his birth; of the crushing contempt I