Singleton picked up the jewels that had come out of the hat-box and held the cases out to Lady McIntyre.
She seemed, as she stood there steadying herself by the chair back, to have gone momentarily blind. Singleton suggested she should take care of the jewels.
"No; oh, no!" she shrank back, and then the poor soul broke into weeping. "Under _William's_ roof!"
Singleton slipped the jewels into the brown suit-case and led the way to the door. Grindley stood with La Motte open in the hollow of his arm. Now and then he made a note on a piece of paper, laid on the open page.
They waited for Lady McIntyre to master her tears.
"What are you meaning to do?" she demanded.
Singleton didn't hesitate an instant. The lady would be shown every consideration. Out of respect to Sir William.
"I suppose," said Lady McIntyre, with unexpected shrewdness, "it's his duty to tell me that." She turned from Napier to the man who stood there with that awful "body of conviction" in the brown suit-case.
"It will be terrible to have her here--terrible. But all the same you shall not take her to London to-night."
"I am afraid those are our instructions," Singleton answered deferentially.
"Instructions!" she echoed. "Sir William issues the instructions here. You cannot take her away till he comes home. Mr. Napier,"--she clutched at his arm--"will you ring up Sir William?"
On the other side of the threshold Grindley paused an instant and looked into the room again. Reluctantly he shut La Motte, and went back for his hat and stick.
"Oh, come away and shut the door!" wailed Lady McIntyre, casting a look of horror about the raided room. A few paces down the hall she loosed her hold on Napier and walked in front of the three men. Even before she got to her own room, she put out her hand like a blind person feeling for the door. She seemed to fall against it. It opened and hid the little figure from their sight.
Napier followed guiltily behind the brown case, glancing in at open doors, listening over the banister.
Nan! His heart suddenly stood still. There was the cap of Mercury on the chest in an angle of the lower hall.
"What is it?" asked the observant Singleton.
"She has--they have come back!" said Napier.
"Oh, no." He went on with the same light, swinging gait.