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The Castlecourt Diamond Case, by Geraldine Bonner—A Project Gutenberg eBook
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The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Castlecourt Diamond Mystery, by Geraldine Bonner
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<div style='display:table;margin-bottom:1em;margin-top:1em;'>
<div style='display:table-row;'>
<div style='display:table-cell;padding-right:0.5em;'>Title:</div>
<div style='display:table-cell;'>The Castlecourt Diamond Mystery</div>
</div>
<div style='display:table-row;'>
<div style='display:table-cell;padding-right:0.5em;'></div>
<div style='display:table-cell;'>Being a Compilation of the Statements Made by the Various Participants in This Curious Case Now, For the First Time, Given to the Public</div>
</div>
</div>
<div style='display:table-row;'>
<div style='display:table-cell;padding-right:0.5em;'>Author: </div>
<div style='display:table-cell;'>Geraldine Bonner</div>
</div>
<div style='height:10px'></div>
<div style='display:table-row;'>
<div style='display:table-cell;padding-right:0.5em;'>Illustrator: </div>
<div style='display:table-cell;'>Harrie F. Stoner</div>
</div>
<div style='height:10px'></div>
<div style='margin-bottom:1em;'>
Release Date: Mar 27, 2021 [eBook #64934]
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Language: English
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</div>
<div style='margin-top:1em;margin-bottom:1.5em;'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG BOOK OF THE CASTLECOURT DIAMOND MYSTERY ***</div>
<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/cover.jpg" width="40%" alt="" /></div>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<h1>THE CASTLECOURT<br />
DIAMOND CASE</h1>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_frontispiece.jpg" alt="" /></div>
<p class="caption"><i>SHE MADE A SORT OF GRASP AT THE CASE</i><br />
<span class="gap">[Page <a href="#Page_30">30</a></span></p>
</div>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="titlepage">
<p><span class="xlarge">The Castlecourt<br />
Diamond Case</span></p>
<p>BEING A COMPILATION OF THE STATEMENTS<br />
MADE BY THE VARIOUS PARTICIPANTS IN<br />
THIS CURIOUS CASE NOW, FOR THE FIRST<br />
TIME, GIVEN TO THE PUBLIC :: :: ::</p>
<p><i>By</i><br />
<span class="large">GERALDINE BONNER</span><br />
<i>Author of “Hard Pan,” “The Pioneers,” etc.</i></p>
<p><i>FRONTISPIECE ILLUSTRATION</i><br />
BY<br />
HARRIE F. STONER</p>
<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/i_title.jpg" alt="" /></div>
<p><span class="large">FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY</span><br />
NEW YORK AND LONDON<br />
1906</p>
</div>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Copyright, 1905</span><br />
BY<br />
GERALDINE BONNER<br />
<br />
[<i>Printed in the United States of America</i>]<br />
Published, December, 1905</p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[5]</span>
<h2 class="nobreak">CONTENTS</h2>
</div>
<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="2" summary="table">
<tr><td class="tdhi">Statement of Sophy Jeffers, lady’s maid<br />
to the Marchioness of Castlecourt</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_9"> 9</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tdhi">Statement of Lilly Bingham, known in<br />
England as Laura Brice, in the<br />
United States as Frances Latimer,<br />
to the police of both countries as<br />
Laura the Lady, besides having recently<br />
figured as a housemaid at<br />
Burridge’s Hotel, London, under<br />
the alias of Sara Dwight</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_47"> 47</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tdhi">Statement of Cassius P. Kennedy, formerly<br />
of Necropolis City, Ohio, now<br />
Manager of the London Branch of<br />
the Colonial Box, Tub, and Cordage<br />
Company (Ltd.) of Chicago and St.<br />
Louis</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_95"> 95</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tdhi">Statement of John Burns Gilsey, private<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6"> [6]</span><br />
detective, especially engaged on the<br />
Castlecourt diamond case</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_127"> 127</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tdhi">The Statement of Daisy K. Fairweather<br />
Kennedy, late of Necropolis City,<br />
Ohio, at present a resident of 15<br />
Farley Street, Knightsbridge, London</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_157"> 157</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tdhi">Statement of Gladys, Marchioness of<br />
Castlecourt</td><td class="tdr" valign="bottom"><a href="#Page_189"> 189</a></td></tr>
</table>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[7]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[8]</span>
<p class="ph1">Statement of Sophy Jeffers, lady’s<br />
maid to the Marchioness of Castlecourt.</p>
</div>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[9]</span></p>
<h2 class="nobreak">Statement of Sophy Jeffers, lady’s<br />
maid to the Marchioness of Castlecourt.</h2>
</div>
<p class="drop-cap">I HAD been in Lady Castlecourt’s
service two years when the Castlecourt
diamonds were stolen. I am
not going to give an account of how
I was suspected and cleared. That’s
not the part of the story I’m here
to set down. It’s about the disappearance
of the diamonds that I’m
to tell, and I’m ready to do it to the
best of my ability.</p>
<p>We were in London, at Burridge’s
Hotel, for the season. Lord
Castlecourt’s town house at Grosvenor
Gate was let to some rich
Americans, and for two years now
we had stayed at Burridge’s. It was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[10]</span>
the third of April when we came to
town—my lord, my lady, Chawlmers
(my lord’s man), and myself. The
children had been sent to my lord’s
aunt, Lady Mary Cranbury—she
who’s unmarried, and lives at Cranbury
Castle, near Worcester.</p>
<p>Lord Castlecourt didn’t like going
to the hotel at all. Chawlmers used
to tell me how he’d talk sometimes.
Chawlmers has been with my lord
ten years, and was born on the estate
of Castlecourt Marsh Manor.
But my lord generally did what my
lady wanted, and she was not at all
partial to the country. She’d say
to me—she was always full of her
jokes:</p>
<p>“Yes, it’s an excellent place, the
country—an excellent place to get
away from, Jeffers. And the farther<span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[11]</span>
away you get the more excellent it
seems.”</p>
<p>My lady had been born in Ireland,
and lived there till she was a woman
grown. It’s not for me to comment
on my betters, but I’ve heard it said
she didn’t have a decent frock to her
back till old Lady Bundy took her
up and brought her to London. Her
father was a clergyman, the Rev.
McCarren Duffy, of County Clare,
and they do say he hadn’t a penny
to his fortune, and that my lady ran
wild in cotton frocks and with holes
in her stockings till Lady Bundy saw
her. I’ve heard tell that Lady Bundy
said of her she’d be the most beautiful
woman in London since the Gunnings
(whoever they were), and just
brought her up to town and fitted her
out from top to toe. In a month she<span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[12]</span>
was the talk of the season, and before
it was over she was betrothed
to the Marquis of Castlecourt, who
was a great match for her.</p>
<p>But she was the beggar on horseback
you hear people talk about.
Lord Castlecourt wasn’t what would
be called a millionaire, but he gave
her more in a month than she’d had
before in five years, and she’d spend
it all and want more. It seemed as
if she didn’t know the value of
money. If she’d see a pretty thing
in a shop she’d buy it, and if she had
not got the ready money they’d give
her the credit; for, being the Marchioness
of Castlecourt, all the shop
people were on their knees to her,
they were that anxious to get her
patronage. Then when the bills
would come in she would be quite<span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[13]</span>
surprised and wonder how she had
come to spend so much, and hide
them from Lord Castlecourt. Afterward
she’d forget all about them,
even where she’d put them.</p>
<p>Lord Castlecourt was so fond of
her he’d have forgiven her anything.
They’d been married five years when
I entered my lady’s service, and he
was as much in love with her as if
he’d been married but a month. And
I don’t blame him. She was the
prettiest lady, and the most coaxing,
I ever laid eyes on. She might well
be Irish: there was blarney on her
tongue for all the world, and money
ready to drop off the ends of her
fingers into any palm that was held
out. There was no story of misfortune
but would bring the tears to
her eyes and her purse to her hand:<span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[14]</span>
generous and soft hearted she was
to every creature that walked. No
one could be angry with her long.
I’ve seen Lord Castlecourt begin to
scold her, and end by laughing at her
and kissing her. Not but what she
respected him and loved him. She
did both, and she was afraid of him
too. No one knew better than my
lady when it was time to stop trifling
with my lord and be serious.</p>
<p>It was Lord Castlecourt’s custom
to go to Paris two or three times
every year. He had a sister married
there of whom he was very fond,
and he and her husband would go
off shooting boars to a place with
a name I can’t remember. My lady
was always happy to go to Paris.
She’d say she loved it, and the theaters,
and the shops—tho what she<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[15]</span>
could see in it <i>I</i> never understood.
A dirty, messy city, and full of men
ready to ogle an honest, Christian
woman, as if she was what half the
women look like that go prancing
along the streets. My lady spent a
good deal of her time at the dressmakers,
and she and I were forever
going up to top stories in little, silly
lifts that go up of themselves. I’d a
great deal rather have walked than
trusted myself to such unsafe, French
contrivances—underhand, dangerous
things, that might burst at any moment,
<i>I</i> say.</p>
<p>The year before the time I am
writing of we went to Paris, as usual,
in March. We stopped at the Bristol,
and stayed one month. My lady
went out a great deal, and between-whiles
was, as usual, at what they<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[16]</span>
call there “<i>couturières’</i>,” at the jewelers’,
or the shops on the Rue de la
Paix. She also bought from Bolkonsky,
the furrier, a very smart
jacket of Russian sable that I’ll be
bound cost a pretty penny. When
we went back to London for the
season her beauty and her costumes
were the talk of the town. Old
Lady Bundy’s maid told me that
Lady Bundy went about saying:
“And but for me, she’d be the mother
of the red-headed larrykins of an
Irish squireen!” Which didn’t seem
to me nice talk for a lady.</p>
<p>We spent that summer at Castlecourt
Marsh Manor very quietly, as
was my lord’s wish. My lady did
not seem in as good spirits as usual,
which I set down to the country life
that she always said bored her. Once<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[17]</span>
or twice she told me that she felt ill,
which I’d never known her to say
before, and one day in the late summer
I discovered her in tears. She
did not seem to be herself again
till we went to Paris in September.
Then she brightened up, and was
soon in higher spirits than ever.
She was on the go continually—often
would go out for lunch, and not be
back till it was time to dress for
dinner. She enjoyed herself in
Paris very much, she told me. And
I think she did, for I never saw her
more animated—almost excited with
high spirits and success.</p>
<p>The following spring we left Castlecourt
Marsh Manor, and, as I said
before, came to Burridge’s on April
the third. The season was soon in full
swing, and my lady was going out<span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[18]</span>
morning, noon, and night. There
was no end to it, and I was worn
out. When she was away in the
afternoon I’d take forty winks on
the sofa, and have Sara Dwight, the
housemaid of our rooms, bring me
a cup of tea, when she’d sometimes
take one herself, and we’d gossip a
bit over it.</p>
<p>If I’d known what an important
person Sara Dwight was going to
turn out I’d have taken more notice
of her. But, unfortunately, thieves
don’t have a mark on their brow like
Cain, and Sara was the last girl
any one would have suspected was
dishonest. All that I ever thought
about her was that she was a neat,
civil-spoken girl, who knew her betters
and her elders when she saw
them. She was quick on her feet,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[19]</span>
modest and well-mannered—not
what you’d call good-looking: too
pale and small for my taste, and
Chawlmers quite agreed with me.
The one thing I noticed about her
were her hands, which were white
and fine like a lady’s. Once when I
asked her how she kept them so well,
she laughed, and said, not having a
pretty face, she tried to have pretty
hands.</p>
<p>“Because a girl ought to have
something pretty about her, oughtn’t
she, Miss Jeffers?” she said to me,
quiet and respectful as could be.</p>
<p>I answered, as I thought it was
my duty, that beauty was only skin
deep, and if your character was honest
your face would take care of
itself.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[20]</span>She looked down at her hands, and
smiled a little and said:</p>
<p>“Yes, I suppose that’s true, Miss
Jeffers. I’ll try to remember it.
It’s what every girl ought to feel,
I’m sure.”</p>
<p>Sara Dwight had the greatest admiration
for Lady Castlecourt.
She’d manage to be standing about
in doorways and on the stairs when
my lady passed down to go to dinner
and to the opera. Then she’d
come back and tell me how beautiful
my lady was, and how she envied
me being her maid. While she was
talking she’d help me tidy up the
room, and sometimes—because she
admired my lady so—I’d let her look
at the new clothes from Paris as
they hung in the wardrobe. Sara
would gape with admiration over<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[21]</span>
them. She spoke a little about my
lady’s jewels, but not much. I’d
have suspected that.</p>
<p>It was in the fifth week after we
came to town—to be exact, on the
afternoon of the fourth day of May—that
the diamonds were stolen. As
I’d been so badgered and questioned
and tormented about it, I’ve got it
all as clear in my head as a photograph—just
how it was and just
what time everything happened.</p>
<p>That evening my lady was going
to dinner at the Duke of Duxbury’s.
It was to be a great dinner—a prince
and a prime minister, and I don’t
know what all besides. My lady was
to wear a new gown from Paris and
the diamonds. She told me when she
went out what she would want and
when she would be back. That was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[22]</span>
at four, and I was not to expect her
in till after six.</p>
<p>Some time before that I got her
things ready, the gown laid out, and
the diamonds on the dressing-table.
They were kept in a leather case of
their own, and then put in a despatch-box
that shut with a patent
lock. When we traveled I always
carried this box—that is, when my
lady used it. A good deal of the
time it was at the bankers’. Lord
Castlecourt was very choice about
the diamonds. Some of them had
been in his family for generations.
The way they were set now—in a
necklace with pendants, the larger
stones surrounded by smaller ones—had
been a new setting made for his
mother. My lady wanted them
changed, and I remember that Lord<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[23]</span>
Castlecourt was vexed with her, and
she couldn’t pet and coax him back
into a good humor for some days.</p>
<p>One of the last things that I did
that afternoon while arranging the
dressing-table was to open the despatch-box
and take the leather case
out. Tho it was May, and the evenings
were very long, I turned on
the electric lights, and, unclasping
the case, looked at the necklace.</p>
<p>I was standing this way when
Chawlmers comes to the side door
of the room (the whole suite was
connected with doors), and asks me
if I could remember the number of
the bootmakers where my lady
bought her riding-boots. Some
friend of Chawlmers wanted to know
the address. I couldn’t at first remember
it, and I was standing this<span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[24]</span>
way, trying to recollect, when I
heard the clock strike six. I told
Chawlmers I’d get it for him. I was
certain it was in my lady’s desk,
and I put the case down on the bureau,
and Chawlmers and I together
went into the sitting-room (the door
open between us and my lady’s
room) and looked for it. We found
it in a minute, and Chawlmers was
writing it down in his pocket-book
when I thought I heard (so light
and soft you could hardly say you’d
heard anything) a rustle like a woman’s
skirt in the next room. For
a second I thought it was my lady,
and I jumped, for I’d no business
at her desk, and I knew she’d be
vexed and scold me.</p>
<p>Chawlmers didn’t hear a thing,
and looked at me astonished. Then<span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[25]</span>
I ran to the door and peeped in.
There was no one there, and I
thought, of course, I’d been mistaken.</p>
<p>We didn’t leave the room directly,
but stood by the desk talking for a
bit. When I told this to the detectives,
one of the papers said it
showed “how deceptive even the best
servants were.” As if a valet and
a lady’s maid couldn’t stop for a
moment of talk! Poor things! we
work hard enough most of the time,
I’m sure. And that we weren’t long
standing there idle can be seen from
the fact that I heard half-past six
strike. I was for urging Chawlmers
to go then—as Lady Castlecourt
might be in at any moment—but he
hung about, following me into my
lady’s room, helping me draw the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[26]</span>
curtains and turn on all the lights,
for my lady can’t bear to dress by
daylight.</p>
<p>It was nearly seven o’clock when
we heard the sound of her skirts in
the passage. Chawlmers slipped off
into his master’s rooms, shutting
the door quietly behind him. My
lady was looking very beautiful. She
had on a blue hat trimmed with blue
and gray hydrangeas, and underneath
it her hair was like spun gold,
and her eyes looked soft and dark.
It never seemed to tire her to be always
on the go. But I’d thought
lately she’d been going too much,
for sometimes she was pale, and once
or twice I thought she was out of
spirits—the way she’d been in the
country last summer.</p>
<p>She seemed so to-night, not talking<span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[27]</span>
as much as usual. There were
some letters for her on the corner
of the dressing-table, and I could
see her face in the glass as she read
them. One made her smile, and then
she sat thinking and biting her lip,
which was as red as a cherry. She
seemed to me to be preoccupied.
When I was making the side “<i>ondulations</i>”
of her hair—which everybody
knows is a most critical operation—she
jerked her head, and said
suddenly she wondered how the children
were. I never before knew my
lady to think about the children
when her hair was being attended to.</p>
<p>She was sitting in front of the
dressing-table, her toilet complete,
when she stretched out her hand to
the leather case of the diamonds. I
was looking at the reflection in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[28]</span>
mirror, thinking that she was as perfect
as I could make her. She, too,
had been looking at the back of her
head, and still held the small glass
in one hand. The other she reached
out for the diamonds. The case had
a catch that you had to press, and I
saw, to my surprise, that she raised
the lid without pressing this. Then
she gave a loud exclamation. There
were no diamonds there!</p>
<p>She turned round and looked at
me, and said:</p>
<p>“How odd! Where are they,
Jeffers?”</p>
<p>I felt suddenly as if I was going
to fall dead, and afterward, when my
lady stood by me and said it was
nonsense to suspect me, one of the
things she brought up as a proof of
my innocence was the color I turned<span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[29]</span>
and the way I looked at that moment.</p>
<p>“Jeffers!” she said, suddenly rising
up quick out of her chair. And
then, without my saying a word, she
went white and stood staring at me.</p>
<p>“My lady, my lady,” was all I
could falter out, “I don’t know—I
don’t know!”</p>
<p>“Where are they, Jeffers? What’s
happened to them?”</p>
<p>My voice was all husky like a person’s
with a cold, as I stammered:</p>
<p>“They were in the case an hour
ago.”</p>
<p>My lady caught me by the arm,
and her fingers gripped tight into
my flesh.</p>
<p>“Don’t say they’re stolen, Jeffers!”
she cried out. “Don’t tell me
that! Lord Castlecourt would never<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[30]</span>
forgive me. He’ll never forgive
me! They’re worth thousands and
thousands of pounds! They <i>can’t</i>
have been stolen!”</p>
<p>She spoke so loud they heard her
in the next room, and Lord Castlecourt
came in. He was a tall gentleman,
a little bald, and I can see
him now in his black clothes, with
the white of his shirt bosom gleaming,
standing in the doorway looking
at her. He had a surprised expression
on his face, and was frowning a
little; for he hated anything like
loud talking or a scene.</p>
<p>“What’s the matter, Gladys?” he
said. “You’re making such a noise
I heard you in my room. Is there
a fire?”</p>
<p>She made a sort of grasp at the
case, and tried to hide it. Chawlmers<span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[31]</span>
was in the doorway behind my
lord, and I saw him staring at her
and trying not to. He told me afterward
she was as white as paper.</p>
<p>“The diamonds,” she faltered out—“your
diamonds—your family’s—your
mother’s.”</p>
<p>Lord Castlecourt gave a start, and
seemed to stiffen. He did not move
from where he was, but stood rigid,
looking at her.</p>
<p>“What’s the matter with them?”
he said, quick and quiet, but not as
if he was calm.</p>
<p>She threw the case she had been
trying to hide on the dressing-table.
It knocked over some bottles, and lay
there open and empty. My lord
sprang at it, took it up, and shook it.</p>
<p>“Gone?” he said, turning to my
lady. “Stolen, do you mean?”</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[32]</span>“Yes—yes—yes,” she said, like
that—three times; and then she fell
back in the chair and put her hands
over her face.</p>
<p>Lord Castlecourt turned to me.</p>
<p>“What’s this mean, Jeffers?
You’ve had charge of the diamonds.”</p>
<p>I told him all I knew and as well as
I could, what with my legs trembling
that they’d scarce support me, and
my tongue dry as a piece of leather.
When I got toward the end, my lady
interrupted me, crying out:</p>
<p>“Herbert, it isn’t my fault, it
isn’t! Jeffers will tell you I’ve taken
good care of them. I’ve not been
careless or forgetful about them, as
I have about other things. I <i>have</i>
been careful of them! It isn’t my
fault, and you mustn’t blame me!”</p>
<p>Lord Castlecourt made a sort of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[33]</span>
gesture toward her to be still. I
could see it meant that. He kept
the case, and, going to the door,
locked it.</p>
<p>“How long have you been in these
rooms?” he said, turning round on
me with the key in his hand.</p>
<p>I told him, trembling, and almost
crying. I had never seen my lord
look so terribly stern. I don’t know
whether he was angry or not, but I
was afraid of him, and it was for
the first time; for he’d always been
a kind and generous master to me
and the other servants.</p>
<p>“Oh, my lord,” I said, feeling suddenly
weighed down with dread and
misery, “you surely don’t think I
took them?”</p>
<p>“I’m not thinking anything,” he
said. “You and Chawlmers are to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[34]</span>
stay in this room, and not move from
it till you get my orders. I’ll send
at once for the police.”</p>
<p>My lady turned round in her chair
and looked at him.</p>
<p>“The police?” she said. “Oh, Herbert,
wait till to-morrow! You’re
not even sure yet that they are
stolen.”</p>
<p>“Where are they, then?” he says,
quick and sharp. “Jeffers says she
saw them in that case an hour ago.
They are not in the case now. Do
either you or she know where they
are?”</p>
<p>I was down on my knees, picking
up the bottles that had been knocked
over by the empty jewel-case.</p>
<p>“Not I, God knows,” I said, and
I began to cry.</p>
<p>“The matter must be put in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[35]</span>
hands of the police at once,” my
lord said. “I’ll have the hotel policeman
here in a few minutes, and the
rooms searched. Jeffers and Chawlmers
and their luggage will be
searched to-morrow.”</p>
<p>My lady gave a sort of gasp. I
was close to her feet, and I heard
her. But, for myself, I just broke
down, and, kneeling on the floor with
the overturned bottles spilling cologne
all around me, cried worse
than I’ve done since I was in short
frocks.</p>
<p>“Oh, my lady, I didn’t take them!
I didn’t! You know I didn’t!” I
sobbed out.</p>
<p>My lady looked very miserable.</p>
<p>“My poor Jeffers,” she said, and
put her hand on my shoulder, “I’m
sure you didn’t. If I’d only a sixpence<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[36]</span>
in the world I’d stake that on
your honesty.”</p>
<p>Lord Castlecourt didn’t say anything.
He went to the bell and
pressed it. When the boy answered
it he gave him a message in a low
tone, and it didn’t seem five minutes
before two men were in the
room. I did not know till afterward
that one was the manager, and
the other the hotel policeman. I
stopped my crying the best I could,
and heard my lord telling them that
the diamonds were gone, and that
Chawlmers and I had been the only
people in the room all the afternoon.
Then he said he wanted them to
communicate at once with Scotland
Yard, and have a capable detective
sent to the hotel.</p>
<p>“Lady Castlecourt and I are going<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[37]</span>
to dinner,” he said, looking at his
watch. “We will have to leave, at
the latest, within the next twenty
minutes.”</p>
<p>Lady Castlecourt cried out at
that:</p>
<p>“Herbert, I don’t see how I can
go to that dinner. I am altogether
too upset, and, besides, it will be too
late. It’s eight o’clock now.”</p>
<p>“We can make the time up in the
carriage,” my lord said; and he went
into the next room with the policeman,
where they talked together in
low voices. I helped my lady on
with her cloak, and she stood waiting,
her eyebrows drawn together,
looking very pale and worried.
When my lord came back he said
nothing, only nodded to my lady<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[38]</span>
that he was ready, and, without a
word, they left the room.</p>
<p>I tried to tidy the bureau and pick
up the bottles as well as I could, and
every time I looked at the door into
the sitting-room I saw that policeman’s
head peering round the door-post
at me.</p>
<p>That was an awful night. I did
not know it till afterward, but both
Chawlmers and I were under what
they call “surveillance.” I did not
know either that Lord Castlecourt
had told the policeman he believed us
to be innocent; that we were of excellent
character, and nothing but
positive proof would make him think
either of us guilty. All I felt, as I
tossed about in bed, was that I was
suspected, and would be arrested and
probably put in jail. Fifteen years<span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[39]</span>
of honest service in noble families
wouldn’t help me much if the detectives
took it into their heads I
was guilty.</p>
<p>The next morning we heard about
the disappearance of Sara Dwight,
and things began to look brighter.
Sara had left the hotel at a little
after seven the evening before,
speaking to no one, and carrying a
small portmanteau. When they
came to examine her room and her
box they found a jacket and skirt
hanging on the wall, some burnt
papers in the grate, and the box
almost empty, except for some cheap
cotton underclothes and a dirty wadded
quilt put in to fill up. Sara had
given no notice, and had not at any
time told any of her fellow servants<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[40]</span>
that she was dissatisfied with her
place or wanted to leave.</p>
<p>That morning Mr. Brison, the
Scotland Yard detective, had us up
in the sitting-room asking us questions
till I was fair muddled, and
didn’t know truth from lies. Lord
Castlecourt and my lady were both
present, and Mr. Brison was forever
politely asking my lady questions
till she got quite angry with
him, and said she wasn’t at all
sure the diamonds were stolen; they
might have been mislaid, and would
turn up somewhere. Mr. Brison was
surprised, and asked my lady if she
had any idea where they were liable
to turn up; and my lady looked annoyed,
and said it was a silly question,
and that she “wasn’t a clairvoyant.”</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[41]</span>Three days after this Mr. John
Gilsey, who is a detective, and, I
have heard since, a very famous
gentleman, was engaged by Lord
Castlecourt to “work upon the case.”
Mr. Gilsey was very soft-spoken and
pleasant. He did not muddle you,
as Mr. Brison did, and it was very
easy to tell him all you knew or
could remember, which he always
seemed anxious to hear. He had me
up in the sitting-room twice, once
alone and once with Mr. Brison, and
they asked me a host of questions
about Sara Dwight. I told them all
I could think of; and when I came
to her hands, and how they were
white and fine, like a lady’s, I saw
Mr. Brison look at Mr. Gilsey and
raise his eyebrows.</p>
<p>“Does it seem to you,” he says,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[42]</span>
scribbling words in his note-book,
“that this sounds like Laura the
Lady?”</p>
<p>And Mr. Gilsey answered:</p>
<p>“The manner of operating sounds
like her, I must admit.”</p>
<p>“She was in Chicago when last
heard of,” says Mr. Brison, stopping
in his scribbling, “but we’ve information
within the last week that
she’s left there.”</p>
<p>“Laura the Lady is in London,”
Mr. Gilsey remarked, looking at his
finger nails. “I saw her three weeks
ago at Earlscourt.”</p>
<p>Mr. Brison got red in the face and
puffed out his lips, as if he was going
to say something, but decided not to.
He scribbled some more, and then,
looking at what he had written as if
he was reading it over, says:</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[43]</span>“If that’s the case, there’s very
little doubt as to who planned and
executed this robbery.”</p>
<p>“That’s a very comfortable state
of affairs to arrive at,” says Mr.
Gilsey, “and I hope it’s the correct
one.” And that was all he said that
time about what he thought.</p>
<p>After this we stayed on at Burridge’s
for the rest of the season, but
it was not half as cheerful or gay as
it had been before. My lord was often
moody and cross, for he felt the loss
of the diamonds bitterly; and my
lady was out of spirits and moped,
for she was very fond of him, and
to have him take it this way seemed
to upset her. Mr. Brison or Mr.
Gilsey were constantly popping in
and murmuring in the sitting-room,
but they got no further on—at least,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[44]</span>
there was no talk of finding the diamonds,
which was all that counted.</p>
<p>This is all I know of the theft of
the necklace. What happened at
that time, and what Mr. Gilsey calls
“the surrounding circumstances of
the case,” I have tried to put down
as clearly and as simply as possible.
I have gone over them so often, and
been forced to be so careful, that I
think they will be found to be quite
correct in every particular.</p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[45]</span>
<p class="ph1">Statement of Lilly Bingham, known<br />
in England as Laura Brice, in the<br />
United States as Frances Latimer,<br />
to the police of both countries as<br />
Laura the Lady, besides having recently<br />
figured as a housemaid at<br />
Burridge’s Hotel, London, under the<br />
alias of Sara Dwight.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[46]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[47]</span>
<h2 class="nobreak">Statement of Lilly Bingham, known<br />
in England as Laura Brice, in the<br />
United States as Frances Latimer,<br />
to the police of both countries as<br />
Laura the Lady, besides having recently<br />
figured as a housemaid at<br />
Burridge’s Hotel, London, under the<br />
alias of Sara Dwight.</h2>
</div>
<p class="drop-cap">I NEVER was so glad of anything in
my life as to get out of that
beastly hole, Chicago. I’ll certainly
never go back there unless there is
an inducement big enough to compensate
for the elevated railroad, the
lake, the noise, the winds, the restaurants,
the climate, and the people.
Ugh, what a nightmare!</p>
<p>England’s the country for me, and
London is the focus of it. You can
live like a Christian here, and enjoy
all the refinements and decencies of
life for a reasonable consideration.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[48]</span>
How my heart leaped when I saw
the old, gray, sooty walls looming up
through the river haze—I thought it
best to sneak by the back way, because
if I go up the front stairs and
ring the bell there may be loiterers
round who had seen Laura the Lady
before, and might become impertinently
curious about her future
movements. And then when I saw
Tom waiting for me—my own Tom,
that I lawfully married, in a burst
of affection, three years ago, at
Leamington—I shouted out greetings,
and danced on the deck, and
waved my handkerchief. It was
worth while having lived in Chicago
for a year to come back to London
and Tom and a little furnished flat
in Knightsbridge.</p>
<p>We were very respectable and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[49]</span>
quiet for a month—just a few callers
climbing up the front stairs, and
demure female tea-parties at intervals.
I bought plants to put in the
windows, and did knitting in a conspicuous
solitude which the neighbors
could overlook. When I saw
the maiden lady opposite scrutinizing
me through an opera-glass I felt
like sending her my marriage certificate
to run her eye over and return.
We even hired a maid of all
work from an agency as a touch of
local color on this worthy domestic
picture. But when the Castlecourt
diamond scheme began to ripen I
nagged at her till she was impudent
and bundled her off. Maud Durlan
came in then, put on a cap and
apron, and played her part a good
deal better than she used to when<span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">[50]</span>
she acted soubrettes in the vaudeville.</p>
<p>We were two weeks lying low,
maturing our plans, tho when I left
Chicago I knew what I was coming
back for. Outwardly all was the
same as usual—the decent callers
still climbed the front stairs, and elderly
ladies who, without any stretch
of imagination, might have been my
mother and aunts, dropped in for tea.
I used to wonder how the people on
the floor below—they were the family
of a man who made rubber tires
for bicycles—would have felt if they
could have seen Maud, our neat and
respectable slavy, sitting with the
French heels of her slippers caught
on the third shelf of the bookcase,
dropping cigarette ashes into the
waste-paper basket.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[51]</span>When all was ready, Tom and I
left for a “business” trip on the
Continent. We went away in a four-wheeler,
driven by Handsome Harry,
the top piled with luggage, my face
at the window smiling a last, cautioning
good-by at Maud. Five days
later, under the name of Sara
Dwight, I was installed as housemaid
on the third floor of Burridge’s
Hotel.</p>
<p>I had done work of that kind before—once
in New York, and at another
time in Paris; having been
born and spent my childhood in that
cheerful city, my French is irreproachable.
The famous robbery of
the Comtesse de Chateaugay’s rubies
was my work—but I mustn’t brag
about past exploits. I had never been
engaged in a hotel theft of the importance<span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">[52]</span>
of the Castlecourt one.
The necklace was valued at between
eight thousand and nine thousand
pounds. The stones were not so remarkable
for size as for quality.
They were of an unusually even excellence
and pure water.</p>
<p>After I had been in the hotel for
a few days and watched the Castlecourt
party, all apprehension left
me, and I felt confident and cool.
They were an extremely simple layout.
Lady Castlecourt was a beauty—a
seductive, smiling, white and
gold person, without any sense at
all. Her husband adored her. Being
a man of some brains, that was
what might have been expected.
What might not have been expected
was that she appeared to reciprocate
his affection. Having made a careful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[53]</span>
study of the manners and customs
of the upper classes, I was not
prepared for this. I note it as one
of those exceptions to rule which
occur now and then in the animal
kingdom.</p>
<p>Besides the marquis and his lady,
there were a maid and a valet to be
considered. The former was a
dense, honest woman named Sophy
Jeffers, close on to forty, and of the
unredeemed ugliness of the normal
lady’s maid. Such being the case,
it was but natural to find that she
was in love with Chawlmers, the
valet, who was twenty-seven and
good-looking. Jeffers was too truthful
to tamper with her own age, but
she did not feel it necessary to keep
up the same rigid standard when it
came to Chawlmers. It was less of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[54]</span>
a lie to make him ten years older
than herself ten years younger.
From these facts I drew my deductions
as to the sort of adversary
Jeffers might be, and I found that,
by a modest avoidance of Chawlmers’
society, I could make her my
lifelong friend.</p>
<p>The evening of the Duke of Duxbury’s
dinner was the time I decided
upon as the most convenient for taking
the stones. I had heard from
Jeffers that the marquis and marchioness
were going. When her
ladyship left her rooms that afternoon
I heard her tell Jeffers that she
would not be back till after six, and
to have everything ready at that
hour. Off and on for the next two
hours I was doing work about the
corridor with a duster. It was near<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">[55]</span>
six when I heard the two servants
talking in the sitting-room. A bird’s-eye
view through the keyhole showed
me where they were, and that they
were engaged in searching for something
in the desk. It was my chance.
With my housemaid’s pass-key I
opened the door a crack, and peeped
in. The leather case of the diamonds
stood on the dressing-table not twenty
feet from the door. It did not
take five minutes to enter, open the
case, take the necklace, and leave.
Jeffers heard me. She was in the
room almost as I closed the door.
Before she could have got into the
hall I was in the broom-closet hunting
for a dust-pan. But she evidently
suspected nothing, for the
door did not open and there was no
indication of disturbance.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[56]</span>Two days later Tom and I returned
from our “business trip” to
the Continent. I quite prided myself
on the way our luggage was labeled.
It had just the right knock-about,
piebald look. We drove up in a
four-wheeler, Handsome Harry on
the box, and Maud opened the door
for us. For the next few days we
were quiet and kept indoors. We
spent the time peacefully in the
kitchen, breaking the settings of the
diamonds and reading about the robbery
in the papers. As soon as things
simmered down, Tom was to take the
stones across to Holland, where they
would be distributed. We threw
away the settings, and put the diamonds
in a small box of chamois-skin
that I pinned to my corset with
a safety-pin.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[57]</span>That was the way things were—untroubled
as a summer sea—till ten
days after our return, when I began
to get restive. I had had what they
call in America “a strenuous time”
at Burridge’s, working like a slave
all day, with not a soul to speak to
but a parcel of ignorant servant women,
and I wanted livening up. I
longed for the light and noise of
Piccadilly, the crowd and the restaurants;
but what I wanted particularly
was to go to the theater and
see a play called “The Forgiven
Prodigal.”</p>
<p>Maud and Tom raised a clamor of
disapproval: What was the use of
running risks? did I think, because
I’d been in Chicago for nearly a
year, that I was forgotten? did I
think the men in Scotland Yard who<span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">[58]</span>
knew me were all dead? did I think
the excitement of the Castlecourt
robbery was over and done? I
yawned at them, and then told them,
with a gentle smile, that they were a
“pusillanimous pair.” There might
be many men in Scotland Yard who
knew me, and that, as they say in
Chicago, “is all the good it would
do them.” They couldn’t arrest me
for sitting peacefully at a theater
looking at a play. As for connecting
me with Sara Dwight, I would
give any one a hundred pounds who,
when I was dressed and had my war-paint
on, would find in me a single
suggestion of the late housemaid at
Burridge’s. So I talked them down;
and if I didn’t convince them of the
reasonableness of my arguments, I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[59]</span>
at least managed to soothe their
fears.</p>
<p>I dressed myself with especial
care, and when the last rite of my
toilet was accomplished looked critically
in the glass to see if anything
of Sara Dwight remained. The survey
contented me. Sara’s mother,
if there be such a person, would
have denied me. I was all in black,
a sweeping, spangly dress I had
bought in New York, cut low, and
my neck is not my weak point, especially
when <i>crême des violettes</i> has
been rubbed over it. My hair was
waved (Maud does it very well,
much better than she cooks, I regret
to say), and dressed high, with a
small red wreath of geraniums
round it. Nose powdered to a probable,
ladylike whiteness, a touch of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[60]</span>
rouge, a tiny <i>mouche</i> near the corner
of one eye, and long, black gloves—and,
presto change! I wore no jewels—their
owners might recognize them.
One could hardly say I “wore” the
Castlecourt diamonds, which were
fastened to my corset with a safety-pin.
They were rather uncomfortable,
but they were the only thing
about me that were.</p>
<p>As I stood in front of the glass
putting on finishing touches, Maud
left the room, and went to the drawing-room
to watch for Handsome
Harry, who was to drive our hansom.
I did not like taking a hired driver,
and, thank goodness, I didn’t! I was
putting a last <i>soupçon</i> of scarlet on
my lips, when she came back, stepping
softly, and with her eyes round
and uneasy looking.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[61]</span>“I don’t know whether I’m nervous,”
she says, “but there’s a man
just gone by in a hansom, and he
leaned out and looked hard at our
windows.”</p>
<p>“I hope it amused him,” I said,
looking critically at my lips, to see
if they were not a little too incredibly
ruddy. “It’s a harmless and
innocent way of passing the time,
so we mustn’t be hard on him if it
doesn’t happen to be very intellectual.
Come, help me on with my
cloak, and don’t stand there like
Patience on a monument staring at
thieves.”</p>
<p>I was irritated with Maud, trying
to upset my peace of mind that way.
She’d had any amount of good times
while I’d been at Burridge’s with
my nose to the grindstone. And here<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[62]</span>
she was, the first time I’d got a
chance to have a spree, looking like
a depressed owl and talking like the
warning voice of Conscience! As she
silently held up my cloak and I
thrust my hand in the sleeve, I said,
over my shoulder:</p>
<p>“And you needn’t go upsetting
Tom by telling him about strange
men in hansoms who stare up at our
front windows. I want to have a
good time this evening, not feel that
I’m sitting by a guilty being who
jumps every time he’s spoken to as
if the curse of Cain was on him.”</p>
<p>Maud said nothing, and I shook
myself into my cloak and swept out
to the hall, where Tom was waiting.</p>
<p>There had been a slight fog all
afternoon, and now it was thick; not
a “pea-soup” one, but a good, damp,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[63]</span>
obscuring fog—a regular “burglar’s
delight.” As we came down the
steps we saw the two hansom lamps
making blurs, like lights behind
white cotton screens. Tom was
grumbling about it and about going
out generally as he helped me in. And
just at that minute, still and quick,
like a picture going across a magic-lantern
slide, I saw a man on the
other side of the street step out of
the shadow of a porch, and glide
swiftly and softly past the light of
the lamp and up the street, to
where the form of a waiting hansom
loomed. It was all very simple and
natural, but his walk was odd—so
noiseless and stealthy.</p>
<p>I got in, and Tom followed me.
He hadn’t seen anything. For the
moment I didn’t speak of it, because<span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[64]</span>
I wasn’t sure. But I’ve got to admit
that my heart beat against the Castlecourt
diamonds harder than was
comfortable. We started, and I listened,
and faintly, some way behind
us, I heard the <i>ker-lump!—ker-lump!—ker-lump!</i>
of another horse’s hoofs
on the asphalt. I leaned forward
over the door, and tried to look
back. Through the mist I saw the
two yellow eyes of the hansom behind us.
Tom asked me what was
the matter, and I told him. He
whistled—a long, single note—then
leaned back very steady and still.
We didn’t say anything for a bit, but
just sat tight and listened.</p>
<p>It kept behind us that way for
about ten minutes. Then I pushed
up the trap, and said to Harry:</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">[65]</span>“What’s this hansom behind us
up to, Harry?”</p>
<p>“That’s what I want to know,” he
says, quiet and low.</p>
<p>“Lose it, if you can, without being
too much of a Jehu,” I answered,
and shut the trap.</p>
<p>He tried to lose it, and we began a
chase, slow at first, and then faster
and faster, down one street and up
the other. The fog by this time was
as thick and white as wool, and we
seemed to break through it like a
ship, as if we were going through
something dense and hard to penetrate.
It seemed to me, too, a maddeningly
quiet night. There was no
traffic, no noise of wheels to get
mixed with ours. The <i>ker-lump!—ker-lump!</i>
of our horse’s hoofs came
back as clear as sounds in a calm at<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">[66]</span>
sea from the long lines of house
fronts. And that devilish hansom
never lost us. It kept just the same
distance behind us. We could hear
its horse’s hoofs, like an echo of our
own, beating through the fog. It got
no nearer; it went no faster. It did
not seem in a hurry, it never deviated
from our track. There was
something hideously unagitated and
cool about it—a sort of deadly, sinister
persistence. I saw it in imagination,
like a live monster with
bulging yellow eyes, staring with
gloating greediness at us as we ran
feebly along before it.</p>
<p>Tom didn’t say much. He doesn’t
in moments like this. He’s got the
nerve all right, but not the brain.
There’s no inventive ability in Tom,
he’s not built for crises. Handsome<span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">[67]</span>
Harry now and then dropped some
remark through the trap, which was
like a trickle of icy water down one’s
spine. I began to realize that my
lips were dry, and that the insides
of my gloves were damp. I knew
that whatever was to be done had
to come from me. I’d got them into
this, and, as they say in Chicago,
“it was up to me” to get them out.</p>
<p>I leaned over the doors, and looked
at the street we were going through.
I know that part of London like a
book—the insides of some of the
houses as well as the outsides; it’s a
part of our business in which I’m supposed
to be quite an expert. The street
was a small one near Walworth Crescent,
the houses not the smartest in
the locality, but good, solid, reliable
buildings inhabited by good, solid,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">[68]</span>
reliable people. The lower floors
were all alight. It was the heart of
the season, and in many of them
there were dinners afoot. I thought,
with a flash of longing—such as a
drowning man might feel if he
thought of suddenly finding himself
on terra firma—of serene, smiling
people sitting down to soup. I’d
have given the Castlecourt diamonds
at that moment to have been sitting
down with them to cold soup, sour
soup, greasy soup, any kind of soup—only
to be sitting down to soup!</p>
<p>We turned a corner sharp, going
now at a tearing pace, and I saw
before us a length of street wrapped
in fog, and blurred at regular intervals
by the lights of lamps. It looked
ghostlike—so white, so noiseless,
lined on either side by dim house<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">[69]</span>
fronts blotted with an indistinct
sputter of lights. There was not a
sound but our own horse’s hoof-beats,
and far off, like a noise muffled
by cotton wool, the echo of our
pursuer’s. Through the opaque,
motionless atmosphere I saw that
the vista into which I stared was
deserted. There was not a human
figure or a vehicle in sight. It was a
lull, a brief respite, a moment of incalculable
value to us!</p>
<p>My mind was as clear as crystal,
and I felt a sense of cool, high exhilaration.
I have only felt this
way in desperate moments, and this
was a truly desperate moment—a
pursuer on our heels and the diamonds
in my possession!</p>
<p>I leaned over the doors, and looked
up the line of houses. It was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">[70]</span>
Farley Street. Who lived in Farley
Street? Suddenly I remembered
that I knew all about the people
who lived in No. 15. They were
Americans named Kennedy—a man,
his wife, and a little girl. He was
manager of the London branch of a
Chicago concern called the “Colonial
Box, Tub, and Cordage Company,”
that I had often heard of in America.
We had marked the house, and made
extensive investigations before I left,
intending to add it to our list, as
Mrs. Kennedy had some handsome
jewelry and silver. Since my return
I had seen her name in the
papers at various entertainments,
and Maud had told me a lot about
her social successes. She was pretty,
and people were taking her
up. All this—that it takes me some<span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">[71]</span>
minutes to tell—flashed through my
mind in a revolution of the wheels.</p>
<p>I could see now that the windows
of No. 15 were lit up. The Kennedys
were evidently at home, perhaps
had a dinner on. They, along
with the rest of the world, would in
a minute be sitting down to soup.
They might be sitting down now; it
was close on to half-past eight. Why
could not we sit down with them?</p>
<p>I lifted the top, and said to Harry:</p>
<p>“Is the hansom round the corner
yet?”</p>
<p>“No,” he answered, “it’s our only
chance. They’re still a bit behind us.
I can tell by the sound.”</p>
<p>“Drive to No. 15, second from the
corner,” I said, “and go as if the
devil was after you.”</p>
<p>I dropped the trap, and as we tore<span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">[72]</span>
down to No. 15 I spoke in a series of
broken sentences to Tom.</p>
<p>“We’re going in here to dinner.
You must look as if it was all right.
If we carry it off well, they won’t
dare to question. We’re Major and
Mrs. Thatcher, of the Lancers, that
arrived Saturday from India.
They’re Americans, and won’t know
anything, so you can say about what
you like. Give them India hot from
the pan. I’ve been living in London
while you’ve been away. That’s how
I come to know them and you don’t.
My Christian name’s Ethel. Do the
dull, heavy, haw-haw style. Americans
expect it.”</p>
<p>We brought up at the curb with a
jerk, threw back the doors, and
dashed up the steps. I caught a
vanishing glimpse of Handsome<span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">[73]</span>
Harry leaning far forward to lash
the horse as the hansom went bounding
off into the fog. As we stood
pressed against the door, Tom whispered:</p>
<p>“What the devil is their name?”</p>
<p>“Kennedy,” I hissed at him—“Cassius
P. Kennedy. Came originally
from Necropolis City, Ohio;
lived in Chicago as a clerk in the
Colonial Box, Tub, and Cordage
Company, and then was made manager
of the London branch. Their
weak point is society. If any people
are there, keep your mouth shut.
Be dense and unresponsive.”</p>
<p>We heard the rattle of the pursuing
hansom at the end of the street,
then through the ground glass of the
door saw a man servant’s approaching
figure.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">[74]</span>“Only stay a few minutes over the
coffee. We’re going on to the
opera,” I whispered, as the door
opened.</p>
<p>I swept in, Tom on my heels. We
came as fast as we could without
actually falling in and dashing the
servant aside, for the noise of our
pursuer was loud in our ears, and
we knew we were lost if we were
seen entering. As Tom somewhat
hastily shut the door, I was conscious
of the expression of surprise
on the face of the solemn butler. He
did not say anything, but looked it.
I slid out of my cloak, and handed
it, languidly, to him.</p>
<p>“No, I won’t go up-stairs,” I
said, in answer to his glare of growing
amaze.</p>
<p>Then I turned to the glass in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">[75]</span>
hat-rack, and began to arrange my
hair. I could see, reflected in it, a
pair of portières, half open, and affording
a glimpse of a room beyond,
bathed in the subdued rosy light of
lamps. I was conscious of movement
there behind the portières—a
stir of skirts, a sort of hush of curiosity.</p>
<p>There had been the sound of voices
when we came in. Now I noticed
the stealthy, occasional sibilant of a
whisper. There was no dinner-party.
We were going to dine <i>en famille</i>.
So much the better. My hair neat,
I turned to the butler, and, touching
the jet of my corsage with an
arranging hand, murmured:</p>
<p>“Major and Mrs. Thatcher.”</p>
<p>The man drew back the curtain,
and, with our name going before us<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">[76]</span>
in loud announcement, I rustled into
the room, Tom behind me.</p>
<p>Standing beside an empty fireplace,
and facing the entrance in attitudes
of expectancy, were a young
man and woman. In the soft pink
lamplight I had an impression of
their two astonished faces, or, rather,
astonished eyes, for they were making
a spirited struggle to obliterate
all surprise from their faces. The
woman was succeeding the best. She
did it quite well. When she saw me
she smiled almost naturally, and
came forward with a fair imitation
of a hostess’ welcoming manner. She
was young and very pretty—a fine-featured,
delicate woman, in a floating
lace tea-gown. Her hand was
thin and small, a real American
hand, and gleamed with rings. I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">[77]</span>
could see her husband, out of the tail
of my eye, battling with his amazement
and staring at Tom. Tom was
behind me, looming up bulkily, not
saying anything, but looking blankly
through the glass wedged in his eye
and pulling his mustache.</p>
<p>“My dear Mrs. Kennedy,” I said,
in my sweetest and most languid
drawl, “are we late? I hope not.
There is such a fog, really I thought
we’d never get here.”</p>
<p>My fingers touched her hand, and
my eyes looked into hers. She was
immensely curious and upset, but
she smiled boldly and almost easily.
I could see her inward wrestlings to
place me, and to wonder if she could
possibly have asked us, and had forgotten
that too.</p>
<p>“And at last,” I continued, glibly,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">[78]</span>
“I am able to present my husband.
I was afraid you were beginning to
think he was a sort of Mrs. Harris.
Harry, dear, Mrs. and Mr. Kennedy.”</p>
<p>They all bowed. Tom held out
his big paw, and took her little hand
for a moment, and then dropped it.
He had just the stolid, awkward,
owlish look of a certain kind of
army man.</p>
<p>“Awfully glad to get here, I’m
sure,” he boomed out. And then he
said “What?” and looked at Mr.
Kennedy.</p>
<p>Mr. Kennedy was not as much
master of the situation as his wife.
He wasn’t exactly frightened, but
he was inwardly distracted with not
knowing what to do.</p>
<p>“Pleased to meet you,” he said,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">[79]</span>
loudly, to Tom, quite forgetting his
English accent. “Glad you could
get around here. Foggy night, all
right!”</p>
<p>I looked at the clock. Tom stood
solemnly on the hearth-rug, staring
at the fire. The Kennedys, for a
moment, could think of nothing to
say, and I had to look at the clock
again, screw up my eyes, and remark:</p>
<p>“Just half-past. We’re not really
late at all. You know, Harry is
<i>such</i> a punctual person, and he’s
afraid I’ve got into unpunctual
habits while he’s been away.”</p>
<p>“He <i>has</i> been away for some time,
hasn’t he?” said Mrs. Kennedy, looking
from one to the other with piquant
eyes that yearned for information.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">[80]</span>“Four years with the Lancers in
India,” Tom boomed out again.</p>
<p>The Kennedys were relieved.
They’d got hold of something. They
both sat down, and it was obvious
that they gathered themselves together
for new efforts.</p>
<p>I did likewise. I realized that I
must be biographical to a reasonable
extent—just enough to satisfy curiosity,
without giving the impression
that I was sitting down to tell my
life-story the way the heroine does
in the first act of a play.</p>
<p>“He arrived only last Saturday,”
I said, “and you may imagine how
pleased I was to be able to bring him
to-night, in answer to your kind invitation.”</p>
<p>“Only too glad he could come,”
murmured Mrs. Kennedy, oblivious<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">[81]</span>
of the terrified side-glance that her
husband cast in her direction.
“Very fortunate that you had this
one evening disengaged.”</p>
<p>“I’m taking him about everywhere,”
I continued, with girlish
loquacity. “People had begun to
think that Major Thatcher was a
myth, and I’m showing them that
there’s a good deal of him and he’s
very much alive. For four years,
you know, I’ve been living here, first
in those miserable lodgings in Half
Moon Street, and after that in my
flat—you know it—on Gower Street.
A nice little place enough, but much
nicer now, with Harry in it.”</p>
<p>“Of course,” said Mrs. Kennedy,
as sympathetically as was compatible
with her eagerness to pounce upon
such crumbs of information as I let<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">[82]</span>
drop. “How dull these four years
have been for you!”</p>
<p>“Dull!” I echoed, “dull is not the
word!” And I gave my eyes an expressive,
acrobatic roll toward the
ceiling.</p>
<p>“She couldn’t have stood it out
there,” said Tom, in an unexpected
bass growl. “Too hot! Ethel can’t
stand the heat—never could.”</p>
<p>Then he lapsed into silence, staring
at the fire under Mr. Kennedy’s
fascinated gaze. Dinner was just
then announced, and I heard him
saying as he walked in behind us:</p>
<p>“Is India very hot, Mrs. Kennedy?
Once in Delhi I sat for four
days in a cold bath, and read the
Waverley novels.”</p>
<p>To which Mrs. Kennedy answered,
brightly:</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">[83]</span>“I should think that would have
put you to sleep, and you might have
been drowned.”</p>
<p>That was one of the most remarkable
dinners I ever sat through. Of
the two couples, the Kennedys were
the least at ease. They were more
afraid of being found out than we
were. The cold sweat would break
out on Mr. Kennedy’s brow when
the conversation edged up toward the
subject of previous meetings, and
Mrs. Kennedy would begin to talk
feverishly about other things. She
was the kind of woman who hates
to be unequal to any social emergency;
and I am bound to confess,
considering how unprepared she was,
she held her own this time with
tact and spirit. She had the copious
flow of small talk so many Americans<span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">[84]</span>
seem to have at command, and
it rippled fluently and untiringly on
from the soup to the savory. I
added to the impression I had already
made by alluding to various
titled friends of mine, letting their
names drop carelessly from my lips
as the pearls and diamonds fell from
the mouth of the virtuous princess.</p>
<p>Tom did well, too—excellently
well. When the conversation showed
signs of languishing, he began about
India. He gave us some strange
pieces of information about that distant
land that I think he invented on
the spur of the moment, and he told
several anecdotes which were quite
deadly and without point. When
they were concluded, he gave a short,
deep laugh, let his eye-glass fall out,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">[85]</span>
looked at us one after the other, and
said, “What?”</p>
<p>I would have enjoyed myself immensely
if a sense of heavy uneasiness
had not continued to weigh on
me. What troubled me was the uncertainty
of not knowing whether
we really had escaped our pursuers.
There was the horrible possibility
that they had seen us enter the
house, and were waiting to grab us
as we came out. If they were there,
and I was caught with the diamonds
in my possession, it would be a pretty
dark outlook for Laura the Lady—so
dark I could not bear to picture it,
even in thought. As I talked and
laughed with my hosts, my mind was
turning over every possible means
by which I could get rid of the
stones before I left the house, trying<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">[86]</span>
to think up some way in which I
could dispose of them, and yet which
would not place them quite beyond
reclaiming. I think my nerves had
been shaken by that spectral pursuit
in the fog. Anyway, I wasn’t willing
to risk a second edition of it.</p>
<p>We sat over dinner a little more
than an hour. It was not yet ten
when Mrs. Kennedy and I rose, and
with a reminder to Tom that we
were to “go to the opera,” I trailed
off in advance of my hostess across
the hall into the drawing-room.
Here we sat down by a little gilt
table, and disposed ourselves to endure
that dreary period when women
have to put up with one another’s
society for ten minutes. It
was my opportunity of getting rid of
the diamonds, and I knew it.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">[87]</span>We had sipped our coffee for a
few minutes, and dodged about with
the usual commonplaces, when I suddenly
grew grave, and, leaning toward
Mrs. Kennedy, said:</p>
<p>“Now that we are alone, my dear
Mrs. Kennedy, I must ask you about
a matter of which I am particularly
anxious to hear more.”</p>
<p>She looked at me with furtive
alarm. I could see she was nerving
herself for a grapple with the unknown.</p>
<p>“What matter?” she said.</p>
<p>I lowered my voice to the key of
confidences that are dire if not actually
tragic:</p>
<p>“How about poor Amelia?” I
murmured.</p>
<p>She dropped her eyes to her cup,
frowning a little. I was thrilling<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">[88]</span>
with excitement, waiting to hear
what she was going to say. After a
moment she lifted her face, perfectly
calm and grave, to mine, and said:</p>
<p>“Really, the subject is a very painful
one to me. I’d rather not talk
about it.”</p>
<p>It was a master-stroke. I could
not have done better myself. I
eyed her with open admiration.
You never would have thought it of
her; she seemed so young. After she
had spoken she gave a sigh, and
again looked down at her cup, with
an expression on her face of pensive
musing. At that moment the voices
of the men leaving the dining-room
struck on my ear.</p>
<p>I put my hand into the front of
my dress, and undid the safety-pin.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">[89]</span>
My manner became furtive and hurried.</p>
<p>“Mrs. Kennedy,” I said, leaning
across the table, and speaking almost
in a whisper, “I entirely sympathize
with your feelings, but I am <i>very
much</i> worried about Amelia. You
know the—the—circumstances.” She
raised her eyes, looked into mine,
and nodded darkly. “Well, I have
something here for her. It’s nothing
much,” I said, in answer to a look
of protest I saw rising in her face—“just
the merest trifle I would like
you to give her. <i>She</i> will understand.”</p>
<p>I drew out the bag, and I saw her
looking at it with curious, uneasy
eyes. The men were approaching
through the back drawing-room. I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">[90]</span>
rose to my feet, and still with the
secret, hurried air, I said:</p>
<p>“Don’t give yourself any trouble
about it. It’s just from me to her.
Our husbands, of course, mustn’t
know. I’ll put it here. Poor
Amelia!”</p>
<p>There was a crystal and silver
bowl on the table, and I put the bag
into it and placed a book over it.</p>
<p>“Mrs. Thatcher,” she said, quickly,
“really, I—”</p>
<p>“Hush!” I said, dramatically,
“it’s for Amelia! <i>We</i> understand!”</p>
<p>And then the men entered the
room.</p>
<p>We left a few minutes later. The
butler called a cab for us, and even
if a person had never been a thief
he ought to have had some idea of
how we felt as we issued out of that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">[91]</span>
house and walked down the steps.
We neither of us spoke till we got
inside the hansom and drove off—safe
for that time, anyway.</p>
<p>We went to Handsome Harry’s
place for that night, and sent him
back for Maud, with the message
she must get out immediately with
what things she could bring. By
eleven she was with us with her
trunk and mine on top of a four-wheeler.
The next morning we had
scattered—I for Calais <i>en route</i> for
Paris, Tom for Edinburgh. Maud
went to join a vaudeville company
that she acts with “between-whiles.”
We had to leave a good
many things in the flat; but I felt
we’d got out cheaply, and had no
regrets.</p>
<p>That is the history of my connection<span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">[92]</span>
with the Castlecourt diamond
robbery. Of course, it was not the
end of the connection of our gang
with the case, but my actual participation
ended here. I was simply an
interested spectator from this on.
My statement is merely the record of
my own personal share in the theft,
and as such is written with as much
clearness and fulness as I, who am
unused to the pen, have got at my
command.</p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">[93]</span>
<p class="ph1">Statement of Cassius P. Kennedy,<br />
formerly of Necropolis City, Ohio,<br />
now Manager of the London Branch<br />
of the Colonial Box, Tub, and Cordage<br />
Company (Ltd.) of Chicago and<br />
St. Louis.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">[94]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">[95]</span>
<h2 class="nobreak">Statement of Cassius P. Kennedy,<br />
formerly of Necropolis City, Ohio,<br />
now Manager of the London Branch<br />
of the Colonial Box, Tub, and Cordage<br />
Company (Ltd.) of Chicago and<br />
St. Louis.</h2>
</div>
<p class="drop-cap">WE HAD been in London two
years when a series of extraordinary
events took place which
involved us, through no fault of our
own, in the most unpleasant predicament
that ever overtook two honest,
respectable Americans in a foreign
country.</p>
<p>I had been sent over to start the
English branch of the Colonial Box,
Tub, and Cordage Company, one of
the biggest concerns of the Middle
West, and it wasn’t two months before
I realized that the venture was
going to catch on, and I was going<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">[96]</span>
to be at the head of a booming business.
I’d brought my wife and little
girl along with me. We’d been married
five years—met in Necropolis
City, and lived there and afterward
in Chicago, where I got my first big
promotion. She was Daisy K. Fairweather,
of Buncumville, Indiana,
and had been the belle of the place.
She’d also attracted considerable attention
in St. Louis and Kansas City,
where she’d visited round a good
deal. There was nothing green about
Daisy K. Fairweather—never had
been.</p>
<p>Daisy and I didn’t know many
people when we first came over, but
that little woman wasn’t here six
months before she’d sized up the
situation, and made up her mind
just how and where she was going<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">[97]</span>
to butt in. The first thing she did
was to conform to those particular
ones among the local customs that
seemed to her the most high-toned.
In Chicago we’d always dined at
half-past six, and given the hired
girls every Thursday off. In London
we dined the first year at half-past
seven, and the second at half-past
eight. We had four servants
and a butler called Perkins, who ran
everything in sight—myself included.
I always dressed for dinner
after Perkins came, and tried to
look as if it was my lifelong custom.
I’d have sunk out of sight in a sea
of shame rather than have had Perkins
think I had not been brought
up to it.</p>
<p>Daisy caught on to everything, and
then passed the word on to me. She<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">[98]</span>
was always springing innovations on
me, and I did the best I could to keep
my end up. She stopped talking the
way she used to in Necropolis City,
and made Elaine—that’s our little
girl—quit calling me “Popper” and
call me “Daddy.” She called her
front hair her “fringe” and her shirt-waist
her “bloos,” and she made me
careful of what I said before the servants.
“Servants talk so!” she’d
say, just as if she’d heard them. In
Necropolis City, or even Chicago,
we never bothered about the “help”
talking. They said what they wanted
and we said what we wanted, and
that was all there was to it. But I
supposed it was all right. Whatever
Daisy K. Fairweather Kennedy says
goes with me.</p>
<p>By the second season Daisy’d<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">[99]</span>
broken quite a way into society, and
knew a bishop and two lords. We
were asked out a good deal, and we’d
some worthy little dinners at our
own shack—15 Farley Street, near
Walworth Crescent, a thirty-five
foot, four-story, high-stooped edifice
that we paid the same rent for you’d
pay for a seven-room flat in Chicago.
Daisy by this time was in with all
kinds of push. She was what she
called a “success.” Nights when we
didn’t go out she’d sit with me and
say:</p>
<p>“Well, I don’t really see how I’ll
ever be able to live in Chicago again,
and Necropolis City would certainly
kill me.”</p>
<p>This same season Lady Sara Gyves
dined with us twice (it was a great
step, Daisy said, and I took it for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">[100]</span>
granted she knew), and once at a reception
Daisy stood right up close to
the Marchioness of Castlecourt, the
greatest beauty in London, and
watched her drink a cup of tea.
Daisy didn’t meet her that time, but
she said to me:</p>
<p>“Next season I’ll know her, and
the season after that, if we’re careful,
I’ll dine with her. Then, Cassius
P. Kennedy, we will have arrived!”</p>
<p>I said “Sure!” That’s what I
mostly say to her, because she’s
mostly right. You don’t often find
that little woman making breaks.</p>
<p>It was in our third season in London,
the time the middle of May,
when the things occurred of which
I have made mention at the beginning<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">[101]</span>
of my statement. It was this
way:</p>
<p>We’d been going out a good deal,
pretty nearly every night, and we
were glad to have, for once, a quiet
evening at home. Of course, that
doesn’t mean the same as it does in
Necropolis City or even Chicago.
We dine, just the same, at half-past
eight, and both of us dress for dinner.
We have to, Daisy says, no
matter how we feel, because of the
servants. The servants in London
are good servants all right, but the
way you have to avoid shocking their
sensitive feelings sometimes makes
a free-born American rebellious. I
like to think I’m an object of interest
to my fellow creatures, but it’s
a good deal of a bother to have it on
your mind that you mustn’t destroy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">[102]</span>
the illusions of the butler or upset
the ideals of the cook.</p>
<p>As we were waiting for dinner to
be announced we heard a cab rattle
up and stop, as it seemed, at our
door. We looked at each other with
inquiring eyes, and then heard the
cab go off—on the full jump, I
should say, by the noise it made—and
a minute later the bell rang
sharp and quick. Perkins opened
the door, and Daisy and I heard a
lady’s voice, very sweet and sort of
drawling, say something in the vestibule.
I peeped through the curtains,
and there were a man and
a woman—a distinguished-looking
pair—taking off their coats and
primping themselves up at the hall
mirror. I’d never seen either of
them before, as far as I could remember,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">[103]</span>
but I could tell by their
general make-up that they were the
real thing—the kind Daisy was always
cultivating and asking to dinner.</p>
<p>I stepped back, and said to her, in
a whisper:</p>
<p>“Somebody’s come to dinner, and
you’ve forgotten all about it.”</p>
<p>She shook her head, and whispered
back:</p>
<p>“I haven’t asked any one to dinner;
I’m sure I haven’t.”</p>
<p>“Well, they’re here, whether we’ve
asked them or not,” I hissed, “and
you can’t turn ’em out. They expect
to be fed.”</p>
<p>“Who are they?”</p>
<p>“Search me! Friends of yours
I’ve never seen.”</p>
<p>“For pity’s sake, don’t look surprised!<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">[104]</span>
Try and pretend it’s all
right.”</p>
<p>We lined up by the fireplace, and
got our smiles all ready. The portière
was drawn, and Perkins announced:</p>
<p>“Major and Mrs. Thatcher.”</p>
<p>They sailed smilingly into the
room, the woman ahead, rustling in
a long, sparkly, black dress. To my
certain knowledge, I’d never seen
either of them before. The woman
was very pretty; not pretty in the
sense that Daisy is, with beautiful
features and a perfect complexion,
but slim, and pale, and aristocratic-looking.
She had black hair with a
little wreath of red flowers in it,
and the whitest neck I ever saw. She
evidently thought she was all right
as far as herself and the house and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">[105]</span>
the dinner were concerned, for she
was perfectly serene, and easy as
an old shoe. The man behind her
was a big, handsome, dense chap—just
home from India, they said,
and he looked it. He’d that dull
way those dead swell army fellows
sometimes have; it goes with a long
mustache and an eye-glass.</p>
<p>I looked out of the tail of my eye
at Daisy, and I knew by her face
she couldn’t remember either of
them. But they were the genuine
article, and she wasn’t going to be
feazed by any situation that could
boil up out of the society pool. She
was just as easy as they were. She’d
a smile on her face like a child, and
she said the little, mild, milky things
women say just as milkily and mildly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">[106]</span>
as tho she was greeting her lifelong
friends.</p>
<p>Well, it went along as smoothly as
a summer sea. They located themselves
as Major and Mrs. Thatcher,
and told a lot about their life and
their movements—all of which I
could see Daisy greedily gathering
in. I didn’t know whether she remembered
them or not, but I didn’t
think she did, she was so careful
about alluding to places where she
had met them. They seemed to
know her all right—Mrs. Thatcher,
especially. She’d allude to smart
houses where Daisy had been asked,
and tony people that were getting
to be friends of Daisy’s. She seemed
to be right in the best circles herself.
I wouldn’t like to say how many
times she mentioned the names of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">[107]</span>
earls and lords; one of them, Baron—some
name like Fiddlesticks—she
said was her cousin.</p>
<p>She didn’t stay long after dinner.
I don’t think I sat ten minutes with
the major—and it was a dull ten
minutes, and no mistake. There was
nothing light and airy about him.
He asked me about Chicago (which
he pronounced “Chick-ago”), and
said he had heard there was good
sport in the Rocky Mountains, and
thought of going there to hunt the
Great Auk. I didn’t know what the
Great Auk was, and I asked him. He
looked blankly at me, and said he believed
a “large form of bird,” which
surprised me, as I had an idea it was
a preadamite beast, like a behemoth.</p>
<p>I was glad to have the major go,
not only because he was so dull, but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">[108]</span>
because I was so dying to find out
from Daisy if she’d placed them and
who they were. They were hardly
on the steps and the front door shut
on them before I was back in the
parlor.</p>
<p>“Who are they, for heavens’
sake?” I burst out.</p>
<p>She shook her head, laughing a
little, and looking utterly bewildered.</p>
<p>“My dear boy,” she said, “I
haven’t the least idea. It’s the most
extraordinary thing I ever knew.”</p>
<p>“Isn’t there anything about them
you remember? Didn’t they say
something that gave you a clew?”</p>
<p>“Not a word, and yet they seem to
know me so well. The queerest
thing of all was that, when you were
in the dining-room with the man, the
woman, in the most confidential tone,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">[109]</span>
began to ask me about some one
called Amelia. It was <i>too</i> dreadful!
I hadn’t the faintest notion what she
meant.”</p>
<p>“What did you say? I’ll lay ten
to one you were equal to it.”</p>
<p>“I realized it was desperate, and,
after going through the dinner so
creditably, I wasn’t going to break
down over the coffee. She said:
‘How about poor Amelia?’ I knew
by that ‘poor’ and by the expression
of her face it was something unusual
and queer. I thought a minute, and
then looked as solemn as I could, and
answered: ‘Really, the subject is a
very painful one to me. I’d rather
not talk about it.’”</p>
<p>We both roared. It was so like
Daisy to be ready that way!</p>
<p>“And then—this is the strangest<span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">[110]</span>
part of all—she put her hand in the
front of her dress and drew out
some little thing of chamois leather,
and told me to give it to Amelia from
her. I tried to stop her, but it was
too late. She put it here in the crystal
bowl.”</p>
<p>Daisy went to the bowl, and took
out a little limp sack of chamois
leather.</p>
<p>“It feels like pebbles,” she said,
pinching it.</p>
<p>And then she opened it and shook
the “pebbles” into her hand. I bent
down to look at them, my head close
to hers. The palm of her hand was
covered with small, sparkling crystals
of different sizes and very
bright. We looked at them, and
then at one another. They were diamonds!</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">[111]</span>For a moment we didn’t either of
us say anything. Daisy had been
laughing, and her laugh died away
into a sort of scared giggle. Her
hand began to shake a little, and it
made the diamonds send out gleams
in all directions.</p>
<p>“What—what—does it mean?”
she said, in a low sort of gasp.</p>
<p>I just looked at them and shook
my head. But I felt a cold sinking in
that part of my organism where my
courage is usually screwed to the
sticking-place.</p>
<p>“Are they real, do you think?”
she said again, and she took the evening
paper and poured them out
on it.</p>
<p>Spread out that way, they looked
most awfully numerous and rich.
There must have been more than a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">[112]</span>
hundred of them of different sizes,
and shaking around on the surface
of the paper made them shine and
sparkle like stars.</p>
<p>“It’s a fortune, Cassius,” she said,
almost in a whisper; “it’s a fortune
in diamonds. Why did she leave
them?”</p>
<p>“Didn’t she say they were for
Amelia?” I said, in a hollow tone.</p>
<p>“Yes; but who is Amelia? How
will we ever find her? What shall
we do? It’s too awful!”</p>
<p>We stood opposite one another
with the paper between us, and tried
to think. In the lamplight the diamonds
winked at us with what
seemed human malice. I turned
round and picked up the bag they
had come from, looked vaguely into
it, and shook it. A last stone fell out<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">[113]</span>
on the paper, quite a large one, and
added itself to the pile.</p>
<p>“Why did she leave them here?”
Daisy moaned. “What did she
bother us for? Why didn’t she take
them to Amelia herself?”</p>
<p>“Because she was afraid,” I said,
in the undertone of melodrama.
“They’re stolen, Daisy.”</p>
<p>I had voiced the fear in both our
hearts. We sat down opposite one
another on either side of the table,
with the newspaper full of diamonds
between us. I don’t know whether
I was as pale as Daisy, but I felt
quite as bad as she looked. And sitting
thus, each staring into the
other’s scared face, we ran over the
events of the evening.</p>
<p>We couldn’t make much of it; it
was too uncanny. But from the first<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">[114]</span>
we both decided we’d felt something
to be wrong. Why or how they’d
come? who they were? what they
wanted?—we couldn’t answer a single
question. We were in a maze.
The only thing that seemed certain
was that they had one hundred and
fifty diamonds of varying sizes that
they had wanted, for some reason, to
get rid of, and they’d got rid of them
to us. And so we talked and talked
till, by slow degrees, we got to the
point where suddenly, with a simultaneous
start, we looked at one another,
and breathed out:</p>
<p>“The Castlecourt diamonds!”</p>
<p>We had read it all in the papers,
and we had talked it over, and here
we were with a pile of gems in a
newspaper that might be the very
stones.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">[115]</span>“And next year I’d hoped to know
Lady Castlecourt. I’d been sure I
would!” Daisy wailed. “And
now—”</p>
<p>“But you haven’t stolen the diamonds,
dearest,” I said, soothingly.
“You needn’t get in a fever about
that.”</p>
<p>“But, good heavens, I might just
as well! Do you suppose there’s any
one in the world fool enough to believe
the story of what happened
here to-night? People say it’s hard
to believe everything in the Bible!
Why, Jonah and the whale is a simple
every-day affair compared to
it!”</p>
<p>It did look bad; the more we
talked of it the worse it looked. We
didn’t sleep all night, and when the
dawn was coming through the blinds<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">[116]</span>
we were still talking, trying to decide
what to do. At breakfast we sat
like two graven images, not eating a
thing, and all that day in the office
I found it impossible to concentrate
my mind, but sat thinking of what
on earth we’d do with those darned
diamonds.</p>
<p>I’d suggested, the first thing, to go
and give them up at the nearest police
station. But Daisy wouldn’t
hear of that. She said that no one
would believe a word of our story—it
was too impossible. And when I
came to think of it I must say I
agreed with her. I saw myself telling
that story in a court of justice,
and I realized that a look of conscious
guilt would be painted on my
face the whole time. I’d have felt,
whether it was true or not, that nobody<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">[117]</span>
really ought to believe it, and
as an honest, self-respecting citizen
I ought not to expect them to. Here
we were, strangers that nobody knew
a thing about, anyway! Daisy said
they’d take us for accomplices; and
when I said to her we’d be a pretty
rank pair of accomplices to give up
the swag without a struggle, she
said they’d think we got scared, and
decided to do what she calls “turn
State’s evidence.”</p>
<p>She thought the best thing to do
was to keep the stones till we could
think up a more plausible story.
We tried to do that, and the night
after our meeting with Major and
Mrs. Thatcher we stayed awake
till three, thinking up “plausible
stories.” We got a great collection
of them, but it seemed impossible to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">[118]</span>
get a good one without implicating
somebody. I invented a corker, but
it cast a dark suspicion on Daisy;
and she had an even better one, but
it would have undoubtedly resulted
in the arrest of Perkins and the
housemaid, and possibly myself.</p>
<p>It was a horrible situation. Even
if we could possibly have escaped
suspicion ourselves, it would have
ruined us socially and financially.
Would the Colonial Box, Tub, and
Cordage Company have retained as
the head of its London branch a man
who had got himself mixed up with
a sensational diamond robbery? Not
on your life! That concern demands
a high standard and unspotted record
in all its employees. I’d have
got the sack at the end of the month.</p>
<p>And Daisy! How would the bishop<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">[119]</span>
and two lords have felt about
it? Had no more use for that little
woman, you can bet your bottom
dollar! Even Lady Sara Gyves,
who, they say, will go anywhere
to get a dinner, would have given
her the Ice-house Laugh. <i>I</i> know
them. And I saw my Daisy sitting
at home all alone on her reception
day, and taking dinner with me
every night. No, sir! That wouldn’t
happen if Cassius P. Kennedy had
to take those diamonds to the
Thames and throw them off London
Bridge in a weighted bag.</p>
<p>So there we were! It was a dreadful
predicament. Every morning
we read the papers with our hearts
thumping like hammers. Every
ring at the bell made us jump, and
we had a deadly fear that each time<span class="pagenum" id="Page_120">[120]</span>
the portière was lifted and a caller
appeared we’d see the buttons and
helmet of a policeman with a warrant
of arrest concealed upon his
person. I began to have awful
dreams and Daisy didn’t sleep at all,
and got pale and peaked. We
thought up more “plausible stories,”
but they seemed to get less probable
every time, and all our spare moments
together, which used to be so
happy and care free, were now dark
and harassed as the meetings of conspirators.</p>
<p>Even concealing the miserable
things was a wearing anxiety. First
we decided to divide them, Daisy to
wear her half in the chamois bag
hung around her neck, while I concealed
mine in a money-belt worn
under my clothes. We had about decided<span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">[121]</span>
on that and I’d bought the
belt, when we got the idea that if we
were killed in an accident they’d be
found on us, and then our memoirs
would go down to posterity blackened
with shame. So we just put
them back in the bag and locked
them up in Daisy’s jewel-case, round
which we hovered as they say a
murderer does round the hiding-place
of his victim.</p>
<p>I never knew before how burglars
felt; but if it was anything like the
way Daisy and I did, I wonder
anybody ever takes to that perilous
trade. We were the most unhappy
creatures in London, feeling ourselves
a pair of thieves, and our unpolluted,
innocent home no better
than a “fence.” There was less in
the papers about the Castlecourt<span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">[122]</span>
diamonds robbery, but that did not
give us any peace; for, in the first
place, we didn’t know for certain
that we had the Castlecourt diamonds,
and, in the second, when we
now and then did see dark allusions
to the sleuths being “on a new and
more promising scent,” we modestly
supposed that we might be the quarry
to which it led. Daisy began to
talk of “going to prison” as a termination
of her career that might
not be so far distant, and to the
thought of which she was growing
reconciled.</p>
<p>This about covers the ground of
my immediate connection with the
stolen diamonds. Their subsequent
disposition is a matter in which my
wife is more concerned than I am.
She also will be able to tell her part<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">[123]</span>
of the story with more literary frills
than I can muster up. I’m no writing
man, and all I’ve tried to do is to
state my part of the affair honestly
and clearly.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">[124]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">[125]</span>
<p class="ph1">Statement of John Burns Gilsey, private<br />
detective, especially engaged on<br />
the Castlecourt diamond case.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">[126]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">[127]</span></p>
<h2 class="nobreak">Statement of John Burns Gilsey, private<br />
detective, especially engaged on<br />
the Castlecourt diamond case.</h2>
</div>
<p class="drop-cap2">AT A quarter before eight on the
evening of May fourth a telephone
message was sent to Scotland
Yard that a diamond necklace,
the property of the Marquis of Castlecourt,
had been stolen from Burridge’s
Hotel. Brison, one of the
best of their men, was detailed upon
the case, and three days later my
services were engaged by the marquis.
After investigations which
have occupied several weeks, I have
become convinced that the case is an
unusual and complicated one. The
reasons which have led me to this
conclusion I will now set down as
briefly and clearly as possible.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">[128]</span>As has already been stated in the
papers, the diamonds, on the afternoon
of the robbery, were standing
in a leather jewel-case on the bureau
in Lady Castlecourt’s apartment.
To this room access was obtained by
three doors—that which led into
Lord Castlecourt’s room, that which
led into the sitting-room, and that
which led into the hall.</p>
<p>Lord Castlecourt’s valet, James
Chawlmers, and Lady Castlecourt’s
maid, Sophy Jeffers, had been occupied
in this suite of apartments
throughout the afternoon. At six
Jeffers had laid out her ladyship’s
clothes, taken the diamonds from the
metal despatch-box in which they
were usually carried, and set them
on the bureau. She had then withdrawn
into the sitting-room with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">[129]</span>
Chawlmers, where they had remained
for half an hour talking.
During this period of time Jeffers
deposes that she heard the rustle of
a skirt in the sitting-room, and went
to the door to see if any one had
entered. No one was to be seen. She
returned to the sitting-room, and resumed
her conversation with Chawlmers.
It is the general supposition—and
it would appear to be the
reasonable one—that the diamonds
were then taken. According to Jeffers,
they were in the case at six
o’clock, and on the testimony of
Lord and Lady Castlecourt they
were gone at half-past seven. The
person toward whom suspicion
points is a housemaid, going by the
name of Sara Dwight, who had a
pass-key to the apartment.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">[130]</span>The suspicions of Sara Dwight
were strengthened by her actions.
At quarter past seven that evening
she left the hotel without giving
warning, and carrying no further
baggage than a small portmanteau.
Upon examination of her room, it
was discovered that she had left a
gown hanging on the pegs, and her
box, which contained a few articles of
coarse underclothing and a wadded
cotton quilt. She had been uncommunicative
with the other servants,
but had had much conversation with
Sophy Jeffers, who described her as
a brisk, civil-spoken girl, whose manner
of speech was above her station.</p>
<p>The natural suspicions evoked by
her behavior were intensified in the
mind of Brison by the information
that the celebrated crook Laura the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">[131]</span>
Lady had returned to London. I
myself had seen the woman at Earlscourt,
and told Brison of the occurrence.
It had appeared to Brison
that Jeffers’ description of the
housemaid had many points of resemblance
with Laura the Lady. The
theft reminded us both of the affair
of the Comtesse de Chateaugay’s rubies,
when this particular thief, who
speaks French as well as she does
English, was supposed to have been
the moving spirit in one of the most
daring jewel robberies of our time.</p>
<p>Brison, confident that Sara Dwight
and Laura the Lady were one and
the same, concentrated his powers in
an effort to find her. He was successful
to the extent of locating a
woman closely resembling Laura the
Lady living quietly in a furnished<span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">[132]</span>
flat in Knightsbridge with a man
who passed as her husband. He
discovered that this couple had left
for a “business trip” on the Continent
shortly before Sara Dwight’s
appearance at Burridge’s, and had
returned shortly after her departure
therefrom.</p>
<p>He regarded the pair and their
movements as of sufficient importance
to be watched, and for a week
after their return from the Continent
had the flat shadowed. One
foggy night, while he himself was
watching the place, the man and
woman came out in evening dress,
and took a hansom that was waiting
for them. Brison followed them,
and the fog being dense and their
horse fresh, lost them in the maze of
streets about Walworth Crescent.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">[133]</span>
He is positive that the occupants of
the cab realized they were followed
and attempted to escape. He assures
me that he saw the driver
turn several times and look at his
hansom, and then lash his horse to
a desperate speed.</p>
<p>One of the points in this nocturnal
pursuit that he thinks most noteworthy
is the manner in which the
occupants of the cab disappeared.
After keeping it well in sight for
over half an hour, he lost it completely
and suddenly in the short
street that runs from Walworth
Crescent, north, into Farley Street;
ten minutes later he is under the
impression that he sighted it again
near the Hyde Park Hotel. But if
it was the same cab it was empty,
and the driver was looking for fares.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">[134]</span>
For some hours after this Brison
patrolled the streets in the neighborhood,
but could find no trace of
the suspected pair. It was midnight
when he returned to his surveillance
of the flat. The next morning
he heard that its occupants had
left. A search-warrant revealed the
fact that they had gone with such
haste that they had left many articles
of dress, etc., behind them.
There was every evidence of a hurried
flight.</p>
<p>All this was so much clear proof,
in Brison’s opinion, of the guilt of
Sara Dwight. Upon this hypothesis
he is working, and I have not disturbed
his confidence in the integrity
of his efforts. The result of my
investigations, which I have been
quietly and systematically pursuing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">[135]</span>
for the last three weeks, has led me
to a different and much more sensational
conclusion. That Sara Dwight
may have taken the diamonds I do
not deny. But she was merely an
accomplice in the hands of another.
The real thief, in my opinion, is
Gladys, Marchioness of Castlecourt!</p>
<p>My reasons for holding this theory
are based upon observations taken at
the time, upon my large and varied
experience in such cases, and upon
information that I have been collecting
since the occurrence. Let me
briefly state the result of my deductions
and researches.</p>
<p>Lady Castlecourt, who was the
daughter of a penniless Irish clergyman,
was a young girl of great
beauty brought up in the direst poverty.
Her marriage with the Marquis<span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">[136]</span>
of Castlecourt, which took place
seven years ago this spring, lifted
her into a position of social prominence
and financial ease. Society
made much of her; she became one
of its most brilliant ornaments. Her
husband’s infatuation was well
known. During the first years of
their marriage he could refuse her
nothing, and he stinted himself—for,
tho well off, Lord Castlecourt is
by no means a millionaire peer—in
order to satisfy her whims. The lady
very quickly developed great extravagances.
She became known as
one of the most expensively dressed
women in London. It had been
mentioned in certain society journals
that Lord Castlecourt’s revenues
had been so reduced by his
wife’s extravagance that he had been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">[137]</span>
forced to rent his town house in
Grosvenor Gate, and for two seasons
take rooms in Burridge’s Hotel.</p>
<p>This is a simple statement of certain
tendencies of the lady. Now let
me state, with more detail, how these
tendencies developed and to what
they led.</p>
<p>I will admit here, before I go
further, that my suspicions of Lady
Castlecourt were aroused from the
first. It was, perhaps, with a predisposed
mind that I began those explorations
into her life during the
past five years which have convinced
me that she was the moving spirit
in this theft of the diamonds.</p>
<p>For the first two years of her
married life Lady Castlecourt lived
most of the time on the estate of
Castlecourt Marsh Manor. During<span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">[138]</span>
this period she became the mother
of two sons, and it was after the
birth of the second that she went to
London and spent her first season
there since her marriage. She was
in blooming health, and even more
beautiful that she had been in her
girlhood. She became the fashion:
no gathering was complete without
her; her costumes were described in
the papers; royalty admired her.</p>
<p>I have discovered that at this time
her husband gave her six hundred
pounds per annum for a dressing
allowance. During the first two
years of her married life she lived
within this. But after that she exceeded
it to the extent of hundreds,
and finally thousands, of pounds.
The fifth year after her marriage she
was in debt three thousand pounds,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">[139]</span>
her creditors being dressmakers, furriers,
jewelers, and milliners in London
and Paris. She made no attempt
to pay these debts, and the tradesmen,
knowing her high social position
and her husband’s rigid sense of
pecuniary obligations, did not press
her, and she went on spending with
an unstinted hand.</p>
<p>It was last year that she finally
precipitated the catastrophe by the
purchase of a coat of Russian sable
for the sum of one thousand pounds,
and a set of turquoise ornaments
valued at half that amount. Each
of these purchases was made in
Paris. The two creditors, having
been already warned of her disinclination
to meet her bills, had, it is
said, laid wagers with other firms to
which she was deeply in debt, that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">[140]</span>
they would extract the money from
her within the year.</p>
<p>It was in the summer of the past
year that Lady Castlecourt was first
threatened by Bolkonsky, the furrier,
with law proceedings. In the
end of September she went to Paris
and visited the man in his own
offices, and—I have it from an eyewitness—exhibited
the greatest trepidation
and alarm, finally begging,
with tears, for an extension of a
month’s time. To this Bolkonsky
consented, warning her that, at the
end of that time, if his account was
not settled, he would acquaint his
lordship with the situation and institute
legal proceedings.</p>
<p>Before the month was up—that
was in October of the past year—his
account was paid in full by Lady<span class="pagenum" id="Page_141">[141]</span>
Castlecourt herself. At the same
time other accounts in Paris and
London were entirely settled or compromised.
I find that, during the
months of October and November,
Lady Castlecourt paid off debts
amounting to nearly four thousand
pounds. In most instances she settled
them personally, paying them in
bank-notes. A few claims were paid
by check. I have it from those with
whom she transacted these monetary
dealings that she seemed greatly relieved
to be able to discharge her
obligations, and that in all cases she
requested silence on the subject as
the price of her future patronage.</p>
<p>I now come to a feature of the
case that I admit greatly puzzles me.
Lady Castlecourt was still wearing
the diamonds when this large sum<span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">[142]</span>
was disbursed by her. As far as can
be ascertained, she had made no effort
to sell them, and I can find no
trace of a frustrated attempt to
steal them. She had suddenly become
possessed of four thousand
pounds without the aid of the diamonds.
They were not called into
requisition till nearly six months
later.</p>
<p>The natural supposition would be
that “some one”—an unknown donor—had
put up the four thousand
pounds; in fact, that Lady Castlecourt
had a lover, to whom, in a
desperate extremity, she had appealed.
But the most thorough examination
of her past life reveals
no hint of such a thing. Frivolous
and extravagant as she undoubtedly
was, she seems to have been, as far<span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">[143]</span>
as her personal conduct goes, a moral
and virtuous lady. Her name has
been associated with no man’s, either
in a foolish flirtation or a scandalous
and compromising intrigue; in
fact, her devotion to Lord Castlecourt
appears to have been of an
absolutely genuine and sincere kind.
While she did not scruple to deceive
him as to her pecuniary dealings, she
unquestionably seems to have been
perfectly upright and honest in the
matter of marital fidelity.</p>
<p>Where, then, did Lady Castlecourt
secure this large sum of money? My
reading of the situation is briefly
this:</p>
<p>Her creditors becoming rebellious
and Lady Castlecourt becoming terrified,
she appealed to some woman
friend for a loan. Who this is I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_144">[144]</span>
have no idea, but among her large
circle of acquaintances there are
several ladies of sufficient means and
sufficiently intimate with Lady Castlecourt
to have been able to advance
the required sum. This was done,
as I have shown above, in the month
of October, when Lady Castlecourt
was in Paris, where she at once began
to pay off her debts. After this
she continued wearing the diamonds,
and, in my opinion—such is her shallowness
and irresponsibility of character—forgot
the obligations of the
loan, which had probably been made
under a promise of speedy repayment,
either in full or in part.</p>
<p>It was then—this, let it be understood,
is all surmise—that Lady Castlecourt’s
new and unknown debtor
began to press for a repayment.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">[145]</span>
There might be many reasons why
this should so closely have followed
the loan. With a woman
of Lady Castlecourt’s lax and unbusinesslike
methods, unusual conditions
could be readily exacted. She
is of the class of persons that, under
a pressing need for money, would
agree to any conditions and immediately
forget them. That she did
agree to a speedy reimbursement I
am positive; that once again she
found herself confronted by an angry
and threatening creditor; and that, in
desperation and with the assistance
of Sara Dwight, she stole the diamonds,
intending probably to pawn
them, is the conclusion to which my
experience and investigations have
led me.</p>
<p>How she came to select Sara<span class="pagenum" id="Page_146">[146]</span>
Dwight as an accomplice I am not
qualified to state. In my opinion,
fear of detection made her seek the
aid of a confederate. Sara’s flight,
with its obviously suspicious surroundings,
has an air of prearrangement
suggestive of having been carefully
planned to divert suspicion from
the real criminal. Sophy Jeffers assured
me that Lady Castlecourt had
never, to her knowledge, conversed
at any length with the housemaid.
But Jeffers is a very simple-minded
person, whom it would be an easy
matter to deceive. That Sara Dwight
was her ladyship’s accomplice I am
positive; that she took the jewels
and now has them is also my opinion.</p>
<p>Being convinced of her need of
ready money, and of the rashness<span class="pagenum" id="Page_147">[147]</span>
and lack of balance in her character,
I have been expecting that Lady
Castlecourt would make some decisive
move in the way of selling the
diamonds. With this idea agents of
mine have been on the watch, but
without so far finding any evidence
that she has attempted to place the
stones on the market. We have
found no traces of them either in
London or Paris, or the usual depots
in Holland or Belgium. It is true
that the Castlecourt diamonds, not
being remarkable for size, would be
easy to dispose of in small, separate
lots, but our system of surveillance
is so thorough that I do not see how
they could escape us. I am of the
opinion that the stones are still in
the hands of Sara Dwight, who,
whether she is an accomplished thief<span class="pagenum" id="Page_148">[148]</span>
or not, is probably more wary and
more versed in such dealings than
Lady Castlecourt.</p>
<p>That her ladyship should have
been the object of my suspicions
from the start may seem peculiar
to those to whom she appears only
as a person of rank, wealth, and
beauty. Before the case came under
my notice at all, I had heard her
uncontrolled extravagance remarked
upon, and that alone, coupled with
the fact that Lord Castlecourt is
not a peer of vast wealth, and that
the lady’s moral character is said
to be unblemished, would naturally
arouse the suspicion of one used to
the vagaries and intricacies of the
evolution of crime.</p>
<p>During my first interview with
her ladyship I watched her closely,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_149">[149]</span>
and was struck by her pallor, her
impatience under questioning, her
hardly concealed nervousness, and
her indignant repudiation of the suspicions
cast upon her servants. All
the domestics in her employment
agree that she is a kind and generous
mistress, and it would be particularly
galling to one of her disposition
to think that her employees
were suffering for her faults. Her
answers to many of my questions were
vague and evasive, and to both Brison
and myself, at two different times,
she suggested the possibility of the
jewels not being stolen at all, but
having been “mislaid.” Even Brison,
whose judgment had been warped
by her beauty and rank, was
forced to admit the strangeness of
this remark.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">[150]</span>The description given me by
Sophy Jeffers of her ladyship’s deportment
when the theft was discovered
still further strengthened
my suspicions. Lady Castlecourt’s
behavior at this juncture might have
passed as natural by those not used
to the very genuine hysteria which
often attacks criminals. That she
was wrought up to a high degree
of nervous excitement is acknowledged
by all who saw her. It is alleged
by Jeffers—quite innocently
of any intention to injure her mistress,
to whom she appears devoted—that
her ladyship’s first emotion on
discovering the loss was a fear of her
husband; that when he entered the
room she instinctively tried to conceal
the empty jewel-case behind her,
and that almost her first words to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_151">[151]</span>
him were assurances that she had
not been careless, but had guarded
the jewels well.</p>
<p>Fear of Lord Castlecourt was undoubtedly
the most prominent feeling
she then possessed, and it showed
itself with unrestrained frankness
in the various ways described above.
Afterward she attempted to be more
reticent, and adopted an air of what
almost appeared indifference, surprising
not only myself and Brison,
but Jeffers, by her remarks, made
with irritated impatience, that they
still might “turn up somewhere,”
and “that she did not see how we
could be so sure they were stolen.”
This change of attitude was even
more convincing to me than her
former exhibition of alarm. The
very candor and childishness with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_152">[152]</span>
which she showed her varying states
of mind would have disarmed most
people, but were to me almost conclusive
proofs of her guilt. She is
a woman whose shallow irresponsibility
of mind is even more unusual
than her remarkable beauty. No
one but an old and seasoned criminal,
or a creature of extraordinary
simplicity, could have behaved with
so much audacity in such a situation.</p>
<p>Having arrived at these conclusions,
I am not reduced to a passive
attitude. I will wait and watch until
such time as the diamonds are either
pawned or sold. This may not occur
for months, tho I am inclined to
think that her ladyship’s need of
money will force her to a recklessness
which will be her undoing. Sara
Dwight may be able to control her to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_153">[153]</span>
a certain point, but I am under the
impression that her ladyship, frightened
and desperate, will be a very
difficult person to handle.</p>
<p>This brings my statement up to
date. At the present writing I am
simply awaiting developments, confident
that the outcome will prove
the verity of my original proposition
and the exactitude of my subsequent
line of argument.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_154">[154]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_155">[155]</span>
<p class="ph1">The Statement of Daisy K. Fairweather<br />
Kennedy, late of Necropolis<br />
City, Ohio, at present a resident of 15<br />
Farley Street, Knightsbridge, London.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_156">[156]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">[157]</span>
<h2 class="nobreak">The Statement of Daisy K. Fairweather<br />
Kennedy, late of Necropolis<br />
City, Ohio, at present a resident of 15<br />
Farley Street, Knightsbridge, London.</h2>
</div>
<p class="drop-cap">I BELIEVE it is not necessary for me
to state how a chamois-skin bag
containing one hundred and sixty-two
diamonds came into my hands
on the evening of May 14th. That it
did come into my possession was
enough for me. I never before
thought that the possession of diamonds
could make a woman so perfectly
miserable. When I was a
young girl in Necropolis City I used
to think to own a diamond—even
one small one—would be just about
the acme of human joy. But Necropolis
City is a good way behind
me now, and I have found that the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">[158]</span>
owning of a handful of them can be
about the most wearing form of
misery.</p>
<p>I suppose there are fearless, upright
people in the world who would
have taken those diamonds straight
back to the police station and braved
public opinion. It would have been
better to have had your word doubted,
to be tried for a thief, put in jail,
and probably complicated the diplomatic
relations between England and
the United States, than to conceal in
your domicile one hundred and sixty-two
precious stones that didn’t belong
to you. I hope every one understands—and
I’m sure every one
does who knows me—that I did not
want to keep the miserable things.
What good did they do me, anyway,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_159">[159]</span>
locked up in my jewel-box, in the
upper right-hand bureau drawer?</p>
<p>We knew no peace from that tragic
evening when Major and Mrs.
Thatcher dined with us. First we
tried to think of ways of getting rid
of them—of the diamonds, I mean.
Cassius, who’s just a simple, uncomplicated
man, wanted to take
them right to the nearest police station
and hand them in. I soon
showed him the madness of <i>that</i>.
Was there a soul in London who
would have believed our story?
Wouldn’t the American ambassador
himself have had to bow his crested
head and tame his heart of fire, and
admit it was about the fishiest tale
he had ever heard?</p>
<p>It would have ruined us forever.
Even if Cassius hadn’t been deposed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">[160]</span>
from his place as the head of the
English branch of the Colonial Box,
Tub, and Cordage Company (Ltd),
of Chicago and St. Louis, who would
have known me? The trail of the
diamonds would have been over us
forever. Lady Sara Gyves would
have gone round saying she always
thought I had the face of a thief,
and the bishop and the two lords
I’ve collected with such care would
have cut me dead in the Park. I
would have received my social quietus
forever. And, I just tell you,
when I’ve worked for a thing as
hard as I have for that bishop and
the two lords and Lady Sara Gyves,
I’m not going to give them up without
a struggle.</p>
<p>Cassius and I spent two feverish,
agonized weeks trying to think what<span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">[161]</span>
we would do with the diamonds. I
never knew before I had so much
inventive ability. It was wonderful
the things we thought of. One of
our ideas was to put a personal in
the papers advertising for “Amelia.”
We spent five consecutive evenings
concocting different ones that would
have the effect of rousing “Amelia’s”
curiosity and deadening that
of everybody else. It did not seem
capable of construction. Twist and
turn it as you would, you couldn’t
state that you had something valuable
in your possession for “Amelia”
without making the paragraph bristle
with a sort of mysterious importance.
It was like a trap set and
baited to catch the attention of a
detective. We did insert one—“Will
Amelia kindly publish her<span class="pagenum" id="Page_162">[162]</span>
present address, and oblige Major
and Mrs. Thatcher?”—which, after
all, didn’t involve us. And for two
weeks we read the papers with beating,
hopeful hearts, but there was
no reply. I thought “Amelia” never
saw it. Cassius thought there was
no such person.</p>
<p>A month dragged itself away, and
there we were with those horrible
gems locked in my jewel-box. I began
to look pale and miserable, and
Cassius told me he thought the diamonds
were becoming a “fixed idea”
with me, and he’d have to take me
away for a change. Once I told him
I felt as if I’d never have any peace
or be my old gay self again while
they were in my possession. He said,
that being the case, he’d take them
out some night and throw them in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_163">[163]</span>
the Serpentine, the pond where the
despondent people commit suicide.
But I dissuaded him from it.</p>
<p>“Perhaps they’ll never be claimed,”
I said. “And some day when
we’re old we can have them set and
Elaine can wear them.”</p>
<p>“You might even wear them yourself,”
Cassius said, trying to cheer
me up.</p>
<p>“What would be the good?” I
answered, gloomily. “I’d be at least
sixty before I’d dare to.”</p>
<p>All through June I lived under
this wearing strain, and I grew
thinner and more nervous day by
day. The season which is always so
lovely and gay was no longer an exciting
and joyous time for me. I
drove down Bond Street with a
frowning face, and it did not cheer<span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">[164]</span>
me up at all to see how many people
I seemed to know. Looking down
the vistas of quiet, asphalted streets,
where the lines of sedate house
fronts are brightened by polished
brasses on the doors and flower-boxes
at the windows, I was no longer filled
with an exhilarating determination to
some day be an honored guest in
every house that was worth entering.
When I drove by the green ovals of
the little parks, which you can’t
enter without a private key, I experienced
none of my old ambition
to have a key too, and go in and
mingle with the aristocracy sitting
on wooden benches.</p>
<p>Even meeting the Countess of
Belsborough at a reception, and being
asked by her, in a sociable,
friendly way, if I knew her cousin<span class="pagenum" id="Page_165">[165]</span>
John, who was mining somewhere in
Mexico or Honduras—she wasn’t
sure which—did not cheer me up at
all. The change in me was extraordinary.
When I first came to London,
if even a curate or a clerk from
the city had asked me such a question,
I’d have made an effort to remember
John, as if Mexico had been
my front garden and I’d played all
round Honduras when I was a child.
Now I said to Lady Belsborough
that neither Mexico nor Honduras
were part of the United States quite
snappishly, as if I thought she was
stupid. And all because of those
accursed diamonds!</p>
<p>It was toward the end of June,
and the days were getting warm,
when the climax came.</p>
<p>The pressure of the season was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">[166]</span>
abating. The rhododendrons were
dead in the Park, and there was dust
on the trees. In St. James’ the grass
was quite worn and patchy, and
strangely clad people lay on it, sleeping
in the sun. One met a great
many American tourists in white
shirt-waists and long veils. I
thought of the time when I, too, innocently
and unthinkingly, had worn
a white shirt-waist, and it didn’t
seem to me such a horrible time,
after all—at least, I did not then
have one hundred and sixty-two
stolen diamonds in my jewel-box.
My heart was lighter in those days,
even if my shirt-waist had only cost
a dollar and forty-nine cents at a
department store in Necropolis City.</p>
<p>The month ended with a spell of
what the English call “frightful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_167">[167]</span>
heat.” It was quite warm weather,
and we sat a good deal on the little
balcony that juts out from my window
over the front door. Farley
Street is quiet and rather out of the
line of general traffic, so we had
chairs and a table there, and used
to have tea served under the one
palm, which was all there was room
for. We could not have visitors
there, for it opened out of my bedroom.
So our tea-parties on the
balcony were strictly family affairs—just
Cassius, and Elaine, and I.</p>
<p>The last day of the month was really
very warm. Every door in the
house was open, and the servants
went about gasping, with their faces
crimson. I dined at home alone that
evening, as one of the members of
the Box, Tub, and Cordage Company<span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">[168]</span>
was in London, at the Carlton, and
Cassius was dining with him. I did
not expect him home till late, as
there would be lots to talk over.</p>
<p>I had not felt well all day. The
heat had given me a headache, and
after dinner I lay on the sofa in the
sitting-room, feeling quite miserable.
Only a few of the lamps were lit,
and the house was dim and extremely
quiet. Being alone that way in
the half dark got on my nerves, and
I decided I’d go up-stairs and go
to bed early. I always did hate sitting
about by myself, and now more
than ever, with the diamonds on my
conscience.</p>
<p>Our stairs are thickly carpeted,
and as I had on thin satin slippers
and a crêpe tea-gown I made no
noise at all coming up. I always<span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">[169]</span>
have a light burning in my room,
so when I saw a yellow gleam below
the door I did not think anything
of it, but just softly pushed
the door open and went in. Then I
stopped dead where I stood. A man
with a soft felt-hat on, and a handkerchief
tied over the lower part of
his face, was standing in front of
the bureau!</p>
<p>He had not heard me, and for a
moment I stood without making a
sound, watching him. The two gas-jets
on either side of the bureau
were lit, and that part of the room
was flooded with light. Very quickly
and softly he was turning over
the contents of the drawers, taking
out laces, gloves, and veils, throwing
them this way and that out of his
way, and opening every box he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_170">[170]</span>
found. My heart gave a great leap
when I saw him seize upon the
jewel-box, and my mouth, unfortunately,
emitted some kind of a sound—I
think it was a sort of gasp of
relief, but I’m not sure.</p>
<p>Whatever it was, he heard. He
gave a start as if he had been electrified,
raised his head, and saw me.
For just one second he stood staring,
and then he said something—of a
profane character, I think—and ran
for the balcony.</p>
<p>And I ran too. There was something
in the way—a little table, I believe—and
he collided with it. That
checked him for a moment, and I
got to the window first. I threw
myself across it with my arms spread
out, in an attitude like that assumed
by Sara Bernhardt when she is barring<span class="pagenum" id="Page_171">[171]</span>
her lover’s exit in “Fedora.”
But I don’t think any actress ever
barred her lover’s exit with as much
determination and zeal as I barred
the exit of that burglar.</p>
<p>“You can’t go!” I cried, wildly.
“You’ve forgotten something!”</p>
<p>He paused just in front of me, and
I cried again:</p>
<p>“You haven’t got them; they’re in
the jewelry-box.”</p>
<p>He moved forward and laid his
hand on my arm, to push me aside.
I felt quite desperate, and wailed:</p>
<p>“Oh, don’t go without opening the
jewelry-box. There are some things
in it I know you will like.”</p>
<p>He tried to push me out of the
way—gently, it is true, but with
force. But I clung to him, clasped
him by the arm with what must have<span class="pagenum" id="Page_172">[172]</span>
appeared quite an affectionate grip,
and continued, imploringly:</p>
<p>“Don’t be in such a hurry. I’m
sorry I interrupted you. If you’ll
promise not to go till you’ve looked
through my things and taken what
you want, I’ll leave the room. It
was quite by accident that I came
in.”</p>
<p>The burglar let go my arm, and
looked at me over the handkerchief
with a pair of eyes that seemed quite
kind and pleasant.</p>
<p>“Really,” he said, in a deep, gentlemanly
voice that seemed familiar—“really,
I don’t quite understand—”</p>
<p>“I know you don’t,” I interrupted,
impulsively. “How could you be
expected to? And I can’t explain.
It’s a most complicated matter, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_173">[173]</span>
would take too long. Only don’t be
frightened and run away till you’ve
taken something. You’ve endangered
your life and risked going to
prison to get in here; and wouldn’t
it be too foolish, after that, to go
without anything? Now, in the jewelry-box”—I
indicated it, and spoke
in what I hoped was a most insinuating
tone—“there are some things
that I think you’d like. If you’d
just look at them—”</p>
<p>“You’re a most persuasive lady,”
said the burglar, “but—”</p>
<p>He moved again toward the window.
A feeling of absolute anguish
that he was going without the diamonds
pierced me. I threw myself
in front of him again, and in some
way, I can’t tell you how, caught
the handkerchief that covered his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_174">[174]</span>
face and pulled it down. There was
the handsome visage and long mustache
of Major Thatcher!</p>
<p>I backed away from him in the
greatest confusion. He too blushed
and looked uncomfortable.</p>
<p>“Oh, Major Thatcher,” I murmured,
“I beg your pardon! I’m
so sorry. I don’t know how it happened.
I think the end of the handkerchief
caught in my bracelet.”</p>
<p>“Pray don’t mention it,” answered
the major, “nothing at all.”</p>
<p>Then we were both silent, standing
opposite one another, not knowing
what to say. It is not easy to feaze
me, but it must be admitted that the
situation was unusual.</p>
<p>“How is Mrs. Thatcher?” I said,
desperately, when the silence had become
unbearable. And the major<span class="pagenum" id="Page_175">[175]</span>
replied, in his deepest voice, and with
his most abrupt military air:</p>
<p>“Ethel’s very fit. Never was better
in her life, thank you. Mr. Kennedy
is quite well, I hope?”</p>
<p>“Cassius is enjoying the best of
health,” I answered. “He’s out to-night,
I’m sorry to say.”</p>
<p>“Just fancy,” said Major Thatcher.
Then there was a pause, and he
added: “How tiresome!”</p>
<p>I could think of nothing more to
say, and again we were silent. It
was really the most uncomfortable
position I ever was in. The major
was a burglar beyond a doubt, but
he looked and talked just like a gentleman;
besides, he’d dined with us.
That makes a great difference.
When a man has broken bread at
your table as a respectable fellow<span class="pagenum" id="Page_176">[176]</span>
creature, it’s hard to get your mind
round to regarding him severely as a
criminal. I felt that the only thing
to do was to graciously ignore it all,
as you do when some one spills the
claret on your best table-cloth. At
the same time, there were the diamonds!
I could not let the chance
escape.</p>
<p>“Oh, Major Thatcher!” I said,
with an air of suddenly remembering
something. “I don’t know
whether you know that your wife
left a little package here that evening
when you dined with us. It was
for Amelia.”</p>
<p>Major Thatcher looked at me with
the most heavily solemn expression.</p>
<p>“To be sure,” he murmured, “for
Amelia.”</p>
<p>“Well,” I went on, trying to impart<span class="pagenum" id="Page_177">[177]</span>
to my words a light society
tone, “you know we can’t find her.
Very stupid of us, I have no doubt.
But we’ve tried, and we can’t, anywhere.”</p>
<p>Major Thatcher stared blankly at
the dressing-table.</p>
<p>“Strange, ’pon my word!” he said.</p>
<p>“So, Major Thatcher, if you don’t
mind, I’ll give it back to you. I
think, all things considered, it will
be best for you to give it to Amelia
yourself.”</p>
<p>I went toward the dressing-table.</p>
<p>“You don’t mind, do you?” I
said, over my shoulder, as I opened
the jewelry-box.</p>
<p>“Not at all, not at all,” answered
the major. “Anything to oblige a
lady.”</p>
<p>I drew out the sack of chamois-skin.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_178">[178]</span>
“Here it is,” I said, holding
it out to him. “You’ll find it in perfect
condition and quite complete.
I’m so sorry that we couldn’t seem
to locate Amelia. Not knowing the
rest of her name was rather inconvenient.
There were dozens of
Amelias in the directory.”</p>
<p>The major took the sack, and put
it in his breast-pocket.</p>
<p>“Dozens of Amelias,” he repeated,
slapping his pocket. “Who’d have
thought it!”</p>
<p>“We even advertised,” I continued.
“Perhaps you saw the personal;
it was in the morning <i>Herald</i>,
and was very short and noncommittal,
but no one answered it.”</p>
<p>“We saw it,” said the major.
“Yes, I recollect quite distinctly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_179">[179]</span>
seeing it. It—it—indicated to us—aw—aw—”</p>
<p>The major reddened and paused,
pulling his mustache.</p>
<p>“That we hadn’t found Amelia
and still had the present,” I answered,
in a sprightly tone. “That
was just it. And so you came to get
it? Very kind of you, indeed, Major
Thatcher.”</p>
<p>The major bowed. He was really
a very fine-looking, well-mannered
man. If he only had been the honest,
respectable person we first
thought him I would have liked to
add him to my collection. I’m
sure if you knew him better he
would have been much more interesting
than the bishop and the lords.</p>
<p>“The kindness is on your side,”
he said. “And now, Mrs. Kennedy,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_180">[180]</span>
I think—I think, perhaps”—he
looked at the window that gave on
the balcony—“I think I’d better—”</p>
<p>“You must be going!” I cried,
just as I say it to the bishop when
he puts down his cup and looks at
the clock. “How unfortunate! But,
of course, your other engagements—”</p>
<p>I checked myself, suddenly realizing
that it wasn’t just the thing to
say to the major. When you’re
talking to a burglar it doesn’t seem
delicate or thoughtful to allude to
his “other engagements.” That I
made such a break is due to the fact
that I’d never talked to a burglar
before, and was bound to be a little
green.</p>
<p>The major did not seem to mind.</p>
<p>“Exactly so,” he said. “My time<span class="pagenum" id="Page_181">[181]</span>
is just now much occupied. I—er—I—”</p>
<p>He looked again at the window.</p>
<p>“I—er—entered that way,” he
said, “but perhaps—”</p>
<p>“I don’t think I’d go out that way
if I were you,” I answered, hurriedly,
“it would look so queer if any one
saw you.”</p>
<p>“Would the other and more usual
exit be safe?” he asked. His eye,
as it met mine, was charged with a
keener intelligence than I had seen
in it before.</p>
<p>“It would have to be,” I answered,
with spirit. “What do you suppose
the servants would think if they saw
you coming out of here? This, Major
Thatcher, is my room.”</p>
<p>“Dear me!” said the major, “I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_182">[182]</span>
suppose it is. I never thought of
that.”</p>
<p>“Wait here till I see if it is all
right,” I said, “and then I’ll come
back and tell you.”</p>
<p>I went into the hall and looked
over the banister. The gas was
burning faintly, and a bar of pink
lamplight fell out from the half-drawn
portières of the drawing-room.
There was not a sound. I
knew the servants were all in the
back part of the house, quite safe
till eleven o’clock, when, if we were
home, they turned out the lights and
locked up. I stole softly back into
my room. The major was standing
in front of the mirror untying the
handkerchief that hung round his
neck.</p>
<p>“It’s all right,” I assured him, in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_183">[183]</span>
an unconsciously lowered voice.
“You can go quite easily; I’ll let
you out. Only you mustn’t make
the least bit of noise.”</p>
<p>He thrust the handkerchief in his
pocket and put on his hat, pulling
the brim down over his eyes. I must
confess he didn’t look half so distinguished
this way. When the
handkerchief was gone, I saw he wore
a flannel shirt with a turned-down
collar, and with his hat shading his
face he certainly did seem a strange
sort of man for me to be conducting
down the stairs at half-past ten at
night. If Perkins, who’d come to
us bristling with respectability from
a distinguished, evangelical, aristocratic
family, should meet us, I
would never hold up my head again.</p>
<p>“Now, if you hear Perkins,” I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_184">[184]</span>
whispered, “for heavens’ sake, hide
somewhere. Run back to my room,
if you can’t go anywhere else. Perkins
<i>must not</i> see you!”</p>
<p>The major growled out some reply,
and we tiptoed breathlessly
across the hall to the stair-head. I
was much more frightened than he
was. I know, as I stole from step
to step, my heart kept beating faster
and faster. Such awful things
might have happened: Perkins suddenly
appear to put out the lights;
Cassius come home early from the
dinner, and open the front door just
as I was about to let the major out!
When we reached the door I was
quite faint, while the major seemed
as cool as if he’d been paying a call.</p>
<p>“Very kind of you, I’m sure,” he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_185">[185]</span>
said, trying to take off his hat. “I
shan’t forget it.”</p>
<p>“Oh, never mind being polite,” I
gasped. “You’ve got the diamonds.
That’s all that matters. Good-night.
Give my regards to Mrs. Thatcher.”</p>
<p>And he was gone! I shut the door
and crept up-stairs. First I felt faint,
and then I felt hysterical. When
Cassius came home at eleven I was
lying on the sofa in tears, and all I
could say to him was to sob:</p>
<p>“The diamonds are gone! The
diamonds are gone!”</p>
<p>He thought I’d gone mad at first,
and then when I finally made him
understand he was nearly as excited
as I. He went down-stairs and
brought up a bottle of champagne,
and we celebrated at midnight up in
our room. We had to tell lies to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_186">[186]</span>
Perkins afterward to explain how
we came to be one bottle short. But
what did lies matter, or even Perkins’
opinion of us? We were no
longer crushed under the weight of
one hundred and sixty-two diamonds
that didn’t belong to us!</p>
<p>That is the history of my connection
with the case. From that night
I’ve never seen or heard of the
stones, nor have I seen Major or Mrs.
Thatcher. The diamonds entered
our possession and departed from
them exactly as I have told, and tho
my statement may call for great credulity
on the part of my readers, all
I can say is that I am willing to
vouch for the truth of every word
of it.</p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_187">[187]</span>
<p class="ph1">Statement of Gladys, Marchioness of<br />
Castlecourt.</p>
</div>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_188">[188]</span></p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<span class="pagenum" id="Page_189">[189]</span>
<h2 class="nobreak">Statement of Gladys, Marchioness of<br />
Castlecourt.</h2>
</div>
<p class="drop-cap">I AM sure if any one was ever punished
for their misdeeds it was I.
I suppose I ought to say sins, but
it is such an unpleasant word! I can
not imagine myself committing sins,
and yet that is just what I seem to
have done. I couldn’t have been
more astonished if some one had told
me I was going to commit a murder.
One thing I have learned—you do
not know what you may do till you
have been tried and tempted. And
then you do wrong before you realize
it, and all of a sudden it comes upon
you that you are a criminal quite
unexpectedly, and no one is more surprised
than you. I certainly know I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_190">[190]</span>
was the most surprised person in
London when I realized that I— But
there, I am wandering all about, and
I want to tell my story simply and
shortly.</p>
<p>Everybody knows that when I
married Lord Castlecourt I was
poor. What everybody does not
know is that I was a natural spend-thrift.
Extravagance was in my
blood, as drinking or the love of
cards is in the blood of some men.
I had never had any money at all.
I used to wear the same gloves for
years, and always made my own
frocks—not badly, either. I’ve made
gowns that Lady Bundy said— But
that has nothing to do with it; I’m
getting away from the point.</p>
<p>As I said before, I was poor. I
didn’t know how extravagant I was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_191">[191]</span>
till I married and Lord Castlecourt
gave me six hundred pounds a year
to dress on. It was a fortune to me.
I’d never thought one woman could
have so much. The first two years
of our married life I did not run over
it, because we lived most of the time
in the country, and I was unused to
it, and spent it slowly and carefully.
I was still unaccustomed to it when,
after my second boy was born, Herbert
brought me to town for my first
season since our marriage.</p>
<p>Then I began to spend money,
quantities of it, for it seemed to me
that six hundred pounds a year was
absolutely inexhaustible. When I
saw anything pretty in a shop I
bought it, and I generally forgot to
ask the price. The shop people were
always kind and agreeable, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_192">[192]</span>
seemed to have forgotten about it as
completely as I.</p>
<p>After I had bought one thing they
would urge me to look at something
else, which was put away in a drawer
or laid out in a cardboard box, and
if I liked it I bought that too. If I
ever paused to think that I was buying
a great deal, I contented myself
with the assurance that I had six
hundred pounds a year, which was
so much I would never get to the
end of it.</p>
<p>After that first season a great
many bills came in, and I was quite
surprised to see I’d spent already,
with the year hardly half gone, more
than my six hundred pounds. I
could not understand how it had
happened, and I asked Herbert
about it and showed him some of my<span class="pagenum" id="Page_193">[193]</span>
bills, and for the first time in our
married life he was angry with me.
He scolded me quite sharply, and
told me I must keep within my allowance.
I was hurt, and also rather
muddled, with all these different
accounts—most of which I could not
remember—and I made up my mind
not to consult Herbert any more, as
it only vexed him and made him
cross to me, and that I can not bear.
All the world must love me. If
there is a servant-maid in the house
who does not like me—and I can feel
it in a minute if she doesn’t—I must
make her, or she must go away. But
my husband, the best and finest man
in the world, to have him annoyed
with me and scolding me over stupid
bills! Never again would that happen.
I showed him no more of them;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_194">[194]</span>
in fact, I generally tore them up as
they came in, for fear I should
leave them lying about and he would
find them. If I could help it, nothing
in the world was ever going to
come between Herbert and me.</p>
<p>I also made good resolutions to be
more careful in my expenditures.
And I really tried to keep them. I
don’t know how it happened that
they did not seem to get kept. But
both in London and in Paris I certainly
did spend a great deal—I’m
sure I don’t know how much. I did
little accounts on the back of notes,
and they were so confusing, and I
seemed to have spent so much more
than I thought I had, that I gave up
doing them. After I’d covered the
back of two or three notes with figures,
I became so low-spirited I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_195">[195]</span>
couldn’t enjoy anything for the rest
of the day. I did not see that that
did anybody any good, so I ceased
keeping the accounts. And what was
the use of keeping them? If I had
not the money to pay them with, why
should I make myself miserable by
thinking about them? I thought it
much more sensible to try to forget
them, and most of the time I did!</p>
<p>It went on that way for two years.
When I got bills with things written
across the bottom in red ink I paid
part of them—never all; I never
paid all of anything. Once or twice
tradesmen wrote me letters, saying
they must have their money, and
then I went to see them, and told
them how kind it was of them to
trust me, and how I would pay them
everything soon, and they seemed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_196">[196]</span>
quite pleased and satisfied. I always
intended doing it. I don’t
know where I thought the money was
coming from, but you never can
tell what may happen. Some friends
of Herbert had a place near the
Scotch border, and found a coal-mine
in the forest. Herbert has no
lands near Scotland, but he has in
other places, and he may find a coal-mine
too. I merely cite this as an
example of the strange ways things
turn out. I didn’t exactly expect
that Herbert would find a coal-mine,
but I did expect that money would
turn up in some unexpected way and
help me out of my difficulties.</p>
<p>The beginning of the series of
really terrible events of which I am
writing was the purchase of a Russian
sable jacket from a furrier in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_197">[197]</span>
Paris called Bolkonsky. It was in the
early spring of last year. I had had
no dealings with Bolkonsky before.
A friend told me of the jacket, and
took me there. It was a real <i>occasion</i>.
I knew the moment that I saw
it that it was one of those chances
with which one rarely meets. It fitted
me like a charm, and I bought it for
a thousand pounds. That miserable
Bolkonsky told me the payments
might be made in any way I liked,
and at “madame’s own time.” I also
bought some good turquoises, that
were going for nothing, from a jeweler
up-stairs somewhere near the
Rue de La Paix, who was selling out
the jewels of an actress. It was
these two people who wrecked me.</p>
<p>Not that they were my only debtors.
I knew by this time that I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_198">[198]</span>
owed a great deal. When I thought
about it I was frightened, and so I
tried not to think. But sometimes
when I was awake at night, and
everything looked dark and depressed,
I wondered what I would do if
something did not happen. In these
moments I thought of telling my
husband, and I buried my head in
the pillow and turned cold with
misery. What would Herbert say
when he found out his wife was
thousands of pounds in debt—the
Marquis of Castlecourt, who had
never owed a penny and considered
it a disgrace.</p>
<p>Perhaps he would be so horrified
and disgusted he would send me
away from him—back to Ireland, or
to the Continent. And what would
happen to me then?</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_199">[199]</span>That summer we went to Castlecourt
Marsh Manor, and there my
anxieties became almost unbearable.
Bolkonsky began to dun me most cruelly.
Other creditors wrote me letters,
urging for payments. The jeweler
from whom I had bought the
turquoises sent me a letter, telling
me if I didn’t settle his account by
September he would sue me. And
finally Bolkonsky sent a man over,
whom I saw in London, and who
told me that unless the sable jacket
was paid for within two months he
would “lay the matter before Lord
Castlecourt.”</p>
<p>We went across to Paris in September,
and there I saw those dreadful
people. My other French and
English creditors I could manage, but
I could do nothing with either Bolkonsky<span class="pagenum" id="Page_200">[200]</span>
or the jeweler. They spoke
harshly to me—as no one has ever
spoken to me before; and Bolkonsky
told me that “it was known Lord
Castlecourt was honest and paid his
debts, whatever his wife was.” I
prayed him for time, and finally
wept—wept to that horrible Jew;
and there was another man in the
office, too, who saw me. But I was
lost to all sense of pride or reserve.
I had only one feeling left in me—terror,
agony, that they would tell
my husband, and he would despise
me and leave me.</p>
<p>My misery seemed to have some
effect on Bolkonsky, and he told me
he would give me a month to pay up.
It was then the tenth of September.
I waited for a week in a sort of
frenzy of hope that a miracle would<span class="pagenum" id="Page_201">[201]</span>
occur, and the money come into my
hands in some unexpected way. But,
of course, nothing did occur. By the
first of October the one thousand
pounds was no nearer. It was then
that the desperate idea entered my
mind which has nearly ruined me,
and caused me such suffering that
the memory of it will stay with me
forever.</p>
<p>The Castlecourt diamonds, set in
a necklace and valued at nine thousand
pounds, were in my possession.
I often wore them, and they were
carried about by my maid—a faithful
and honest creature called Sophy
Jeffers. On one of my first trips to
Paris a friend of mine had taken me
to the office of a well-known dealer
in precious and artificial stones who,
without its being generally known,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_202">[202]</span>
did a sort of pawnbroking business
among the upper classes. My friend
had gone there to pawn a pearl necklace,
and had told me all about it—how
much she obtained on the
necklace, and how she hoped to redeem
it within the year, and how she
was to have it copied in imitation
pearls. The idea that came to me
was to go to this place and pawn the
Castlecourt diamonds, having them
duplicated in paste.</p>
<p>I went there on the second day of
October. How awful it was! I wore
a heavy veil, and gave a fictitious
name. Several men looked at the
diamonds, and I noticed that they
looked at me and whispered together.
Finally they told me they would give
me four thousand pounds on them,
at some interest—I’ve forgotten<span class="pagenum" id="Page_203">[203]</span>
what it was now—and that they
would replace them with paste, so
that only an expert could tell the
difference. The next day I went
back, and they gave me the money.
I do not think they had any idea
who I was. At any rate, while the
papers were full of speculations
about the Castlecourt diamonds, they
made no sign.</p>
<p>I paid off all my debts, both in
Paris and London; I even paid a
year’s interest on the diamonds. For
a short time I breathed again, and
was gay and light-hearted. My husband
would never know that I had
not paid my bills for five years and
had been threatened with a lawsuit.
It was delightful to get rid of this
fear, and I was quite my old self.
I suppose I ought to have felt more<span class="pagenum" id="Page_204">[204]</span>
guilty; but when one is relieved of
a great weight, one’s conscience is
not so sensitive as it gets when there
is really nothing to be sensitive
about.</p>
<p>It was after I had grown accustomed
to feeling free and unworried
that I began to realize what I had
done. I had stolen the diamonds.
I was a thief! It did not comfort me
much to think that no one might
ever find it out; in fact, I do not
think it comforted me at all, and I
know in the beginning I expected
it would. It was what I had done
that rankled in me. I felt that I
would never be peaceful again till
they were redeemed and put back
in their old settings. That was what
I continually dreamed of. It seemed
to me if I could see them once more<span class="pagenum" id="Page_205">[205]</span>
in their own case I would be happy
and care free, as I had been in those
first perfect years of my married
life.</p>
<p>The fear that at this time most
haunted me and was most terrifying
was that my husband might discover
what I had done. His wife,
that he had so loved and trusted, had
become a thief! No one who has not
gone through it knows how I felt.
I did not know any one could suffer
so. I went out constantly, to try and
forget; and, when things were very
cheerful and amusing, I sometimes
did. And then I remembered—I was
a thief; I had stolen my husband’s
diamonds, and, if he ever found it
out, what would happen to me?</p>
<p>This was the position I was in
when the false diamonds were taken.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_206">[206]</span>
It was the last thing in the world I
had thought could happen. When,
that night of the Duke of Duxbury’s
dinner, I saw the empty case and
Jeffers’ terrified face, the world
reeled around me. I could not for
a moment take it in. Only, in my
mind, the diamonds had become a
sort of nightmare; anything to do
with them was a menace, and I followed
an instinct that had possession
of me when I tried to hide the empty
case from my husband.</p>
<p>Then, when my mind had cleared
and I had time to think, I saw that
if they recovered the paste necklace
they might find out that it was not
real, and all would be lost. It was
a horrible predicament. I really did
not know what I wanted. If the diamonds
were found, and seen to be<span class="pagenum" id="Page_207">[207]</span>
false, it would all come out, and Herbert
would know I was a thief.
When I thought of this I tried to
divert the detectives from hunting
for them, and I told that silly, sheepish
Mr. Brison that I did not see
how he could be so sure they were
stolen, that they might have been
mislaid. Mr. Brison seemed surprised,
and that made me angry, because,
after all, a diamond necklace
is not the sort of thing that gets mislaid,
and I felt I had been foolish
and had not gained anything by being
so.</p>
<p>The days passed, and nothing was
heard of the necklace. I wished
desperately now that it would be
found. For how, unless it was, could
I eventually redeem the real diamonds,
and once more feel honest<span class="pagenum" id="Page_208">[208]</span>
and respectable? If I suddenly appeared
with them, how could I explain
it? Everybody would say I
had stolen them, unless I invented
some story about their being lost
and then found, and I am not clever
at inventing stories. As to where I
should get the money to redeem
them, I often thought of that; but
never could think of any way that
sounded possible and reasonable. I
have always waited for “things to
turn up,” and they generally did;
but in this case nothing that I wanted
or expected turned up. Besides,
four thousand pounds is a good deal
of money to come into one’s hands
suddenly and unexpectedly. If it
were a smaller sum it might, but
four thousand pounds was too much.
There was nobody to die and leave<span class="pagenum" id="Page_209">[209]</span>
it to me, and I certainly could not
steal it, or make it myself.</p>
<p>So, as one may see, I was beset
with troubles on all sides. The season
wore itself away, and I was glad
to be done with it. For the first
time, there had been no pleasure in
it. Anxieties that no one guessed
were always with me, and always I
found myself surreptitiously watching
my husband to see if he suspected,
to see if he showed any symptoms
of growing cold to me and being
indifferent. As I drove through
the Park in the carriage these dreary
thoughts were always at my heart,
and it was heavy as lead. I forgot
the passers-by who were so amusing,
and, with my head hanging, looked
into my lap. Suppose Herbert
guessed? Suppose Herbert found<span class="pagenum" id="Page_210">[210]</span>
out? These were the questions that
went circling through my brain and
never stopped. Sometimes, when
Herbert was beside me, I suddenly
wanted to cry out:</p>
<p>“Herbert, <i>I</i> took the diamonds!
<i>I</i> was the thief! I can’t hide it any
more, or live in this uncertainty.
All I want to know is, do you hate
me and are you going to leave me?”</p>
<p>But I never did it. I looked at
Herbert, and was afraid. What
would I do if he left me? Go back
to Ireland and die.</p>
<p>We went to Castlecourt Marsh
Manor in the end of June. By this
time I had begun to feel quite ill.
Herbert insisted on my consulting a
doctor before I left town, and the
doctor said my heart was all wrong
and something was the matter with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_211">[211]</span>
my nerves. But it was only the
sense of guilt, that every day grew
more oppressive. I thought I might
feel better in the country. I had
always disliked it, and now it seemed
like a harbor of refuge, where I
could be quiet with my children. I
had grown to hate London. It was
London that had played upon my
weaknesses and drawn me into all
my trouble. I had not run into debt
in the country, and, after all, I had
never been as happy as I was the
two years after our marriage, when
we had lived at Castlecourt Marsh
Manor. Those were my <i>beaux jours</i>!
How bright and beautiful they
seemed now, when I looked back on
them from these dark days of fear
and disgrace!</p>
<p>It was not much better in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_212">[212]</span>
country. A change of scene can not
make a difference when the trouble
is a dark secret. And that dark secret
kept growing darker every day.
I feared to speak of the diamonds to
Herbert, and yet every letter that
came for him filled me with alarm,
lest it was either to say that they
were found or that they were not
found. Herbert went up to London
at intervals and saw Mr. Gilsey, and
at night when he came home I trembled
so that I found it difficult to
stand till he had told me all that Mr.
Gilsey had said. Once when he was
beginning to tell me that Mr. Gilsey
had some idea they had traced the
diamonds to Paris I fainted, and it
was some time before they could
bring me back.</p>
<p>July was very hot, and I gave<span class="pagenum" id="Page_213">[213]</span>
that as the cause of my changed appearance
and listless manner. I was
really in wretched health, and Herbert
became exceedingly worried
about me. He suggested that we
should go on the Continent for a
trip, but I shrank from the thought
of it. I felt as if the sight of Paris,
where the diamonds were waiting to
be redeemed, would kill me outright.
I did not want to leave Castlecourt
Marsh Manor to go anywhere. I
only wanted to be happy again—to
be the way I was before I had taken
the diamonds.</p>
<p>And I knew now that this could
never be till I told my husband. I
knew that to win back my peace of
mind I had to confess all, and hear
him say he forgave me. I tried to
several times, but it was impossible.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_214">[214]</span>
As the moment that I had chosen for
confession approached, my heart beat
so that I could scarcely breathe, and
I trembled like a person in a chill.
With Herbert looking at me so kindly,
so tenderly, the words died away
on my lips, or I said something quite
different to what I had intended saying.
It was useless. As the days
went by I knew that I would never
dare tell, that for the rest of my
life I would be crushed under the
sense of guilt that seemed too heavy
to be borne.</p>
<p>It was late one afternoon in the
middle of July that the crash came.
Never, never shall I forget that day!
So dark and awful at first, and
then— But I must follow the story
just as it happened.</p>
<p>Herbert and I had had tea in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_215">[215]</span>
library. It was warm weather, and
the windows that led to the terrace
were wide open. Through them I
could see the beautiful landscape—rolling
hills with great trees dotted
over them, all the colors brighter and
deeper than at midday, for the sun
was getting low. I was sitting by
one of the windows looking out on
this, and thinking how different had
been my feelings when I had come
here as a bride and loved it all, and
been so full of joy. My hands hung
limp over the arms of the chair. I
had no desire to move or speak. It
is so agonizing, when you are miserable,
looking back on days that were
happy!</p>
<p>As I was sitting this way, Thomas,
one of the footmen, came in with the
letters. I noticed that he had quite<span class="pagenum" id="Page_216">[216]</span>
a packet of them. Some were mine,
and I laid them on the table at my
elbow. Idly and without interest I
saw that in Herbert’s bunch there
was a small box, such as jewelry is
sent about in. Thomas left the room,
and I continued looking out of the
window until I suddenly heard Herbert
give a suppressed exclamation.
I turned toward him, and saw that
he had the open box in his hand.</p>
<p>“What does this mean?” he said.
“What an extraordinary thing!
Look here, Gladys.”</p>
<p>And he came toward me, holding
out the box. It was full of cotton
wool, and lying on this were a great
quantity of unset diamonds of different
sizes. My heart gave a leap into
my throat. I sat up, clutching the
arms of the chair.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_217">[217]</span>“What are they?” I said, hearing
my voice suddenly high and loud.
“Where did they come from?”</p>
<p>“I don’t know anything about
them! It’s too odd! See what’s
written on this piece of paper that
was inside the box.”</p>
<p>He held out a small piece of paper,
on which the creases of several folds
were plainly marked. Across it, in
typing, ran two sentences. I snatched
the paper and read the words:</p>
<div class="blockquot">
<p>We don’t want <i>your</i> diamonds. You can
keep them, and with them accept our kind
regards.</p>
</div>
<p>The paper fluttered to my feet.
I knew in a moment what it all
meant. The thieves had discovered
that the diamonds were paste, and
had returned them. I was conscious<span class="pagenum" id="Page_218">[218]</span>
of Herbert’s startled face suddenly
charged with an expression of sharp
anxiety as he cried:</p>
<p>“Why, Gladys, what is it? You’re
as white as death!”</p>
<p>He came toward me, but I motioned
him away and rose to my
feet. I knew then that the hour had
come, and tho I suspect I <i>was</i> very
white, I did not feel so frightened
as I had done in the past.</p>
<p>“Those <i>are</i> your diamonds, Herbert,”
I said, quietly and distinctly,
“or, perhaps, I ought to say those
are the substitutes for them. <i>Your</i>
diamonds are in Paris, at Barriere’s,
<i>au quatrème</i>, on the Rue Croix des
Petits Champs.”</p>
<p>“Gladys!” he exclaimed, “what
do you mean? What are you talking
about? You look so white and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_219">[219]</span>
strange! Sit down, darling, and tell
me what you mean.”</p>
<p>“Oh, Herbert,” I cried, with my
voice suddenly full of agony, “let
me tell you! Don’t stop me. If
you’re angry with me and hate me,
wait till I’ve finished before you say
so. I’ve got to confess it all. I’ve
got to, dear. You must listen to me,
and not frighten me till I have done;
for if I don’t tell you now, I shall
certainly die.”</p>
<p>And then I told—I told it all. I
didn’t leave out a single thing. My
first bills, and Bolkonsky, and the
jeweler, and the pawnbroking place,
and everything was in it. Once I
was started, it was not so hard, and
I poured it out. I didn’t try to
make it better, or ask to be forgiven.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_220">[220]</span>
But when it was all finished, I said,
in a voice that I could hear was
suddenly husky and trembling:</p>
<p>“And now I suppose you’ll not
like me any more. It’s quite natural
that you shouldn’t. I only ask one
thing, and I know, of course, I have
no right to ask it—that is, that you
won’t send me away from you. I
have been very wicked. I suppose
I ought to be put in prison. But,
oh, Herbert, no matter what I’ve
been, I’ve loved you! That’s something.”</p>
<p>I could not go any further, and
there was no need; for my dear husband
did not seem angry at all. He
took me, all weeping and trembling,
into his arms, and said the sweetest
things to me—the sort of things<span class="pagenum" id="Page_221">[221]</span>
one doesn’t write down with a pen—just
between him and me.</p>
<p>And I?—I turned my face into
his shoulder and cried feebly. No
one knows how happy I felt except
a person who has been completely
miserable and suddenly finds her
misery ended. It is really worth being
miserable to thoroughly appreciate
the joy of being happy again.</p>
<p>Well, that is really the end of the
statement. Herbert went to Paris
a few days later and redeemed the
diamonds, and they are now being
set in imitation of the old settings,
which are lost. I would not go to
Paris with him. Nor will I go to
London next season. Both places
are too full of horrible memories.
Perhaps some day I shall feel about<span class="pagenum" id="Page_222">[222]</span>
them as I did before the diamonds
were taken, but now I do not want
to leave the country at all. Besides,
we can economize here, and the four
thousand pounds necessary to get
back the stones was a good deal
for Herbert to have to pay out
just now. And then it is so sweet
and peaceful in the country. Nothing
troubles one. Oh, how delightful
a thing it is to have an easy conscience!
One does not know how
good it is till one has lost it.</p>
<p>This finishes my statement. I
dare say it is a very bad one, for I
am not clever at all. But it has the
one merit of being entirely truthful,
and I have told everything—just
how wicked I was, and just why I
was so wicked. Nothing has been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_223">[223]</span>
held back, and nothing has been set
down falsely. It is an unprejudiced
and accurate account of my share
in the Castlecourt diamond case.</p>
<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" />
<div class="chapter">
<div class="transnote">
<p class="ph1">TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:</p>
<p>Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.</p>
<p>Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.</p>
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