"At the end I had no choice," replied Madame. "But I feel now, and have felt many times since the tragedy of the Humming Top, that he would never have leaped upon me had I spoken. My power over him was great. Until recently he had honoured me as a goddess. With my eyes upon his he could not have struck. And yet I waited for his attack to be delivered. I waited while he felt the point of the dagger, and tested the fittings on his hand. I might have spoken in the old friendly tone, which always moved him—and yet I did not. For it suddenly was revealed to me that here was the solution of his troubled destiny. Now that Willatopy, the dear boy of Tops Island, was no more, his successor, Lord Topsham, were better dead before far worse disasters than death, a clean, quick death, overtook him. So I waited for him to spring—it was a terrible moment, and I cannot speak of it now without a creeping of the flesh—I waited for him to spring that I might shoot. I am not a praying woman," added she, "but there was a prayer in my heart when I sped the bullet through his. I never loved the boy more honestly than in that instant when I deliberately slew him."
They turned to leave the room.
"I shall be sorry to give up my temporary ownership of the Humming Top," said Madame. "I agree with Alexander that she is a bonnie wee beastie."
"Will you not keep her?" asked Toppys calmly.
Madame shook her head. "A yacht, especially a steam yacht of a thousand tons, is too sharp-edged a gift for my poor hands to receive. She must cost twenty thousand a year to run, and I cannot spend a tithe of that amount upon my travels."
"I did not mean that you should maintain her," said Toppys.
Madame smiled wickedly. "Sir John Toppys, in my day I have been offered many gifts by the undiscerning. Jewellery, of course. Perfectly appointed flats and houses, of course. One refuses calmly from habit I have never yet had a fully maintained thousand-ton yacht laid at my feet, yet it costs me little to refuse. Madame Gilbert, Sir John Toppys, is not for sale, and she is slightly disappointed that one whom she thought her friend should have offered to purchase her."
"You misunderstand me again," said Sir John Toppys, "I suspect wilfully. I did not offer the Humming Top as your purchase price. I wished to hint, somewhat crudely I fear, that I am a widower, and that——"
He paused. Madame looked at him curiously. It was almost unbelievable, yet plain to see, that the Baronet of Wigan was tongue-tied with genuine emotion. She softened towards him, and her mantle of cynicism fell.