"Very——" She looked at him utterly perplexed. "Under what circumstances?"
"Under the circumstances that he is her brother, and that she lived with a cat."
"Her brother! Her br-o-th-er!—as much her brother as you are, or would like to be! It's just like you to believe a tale like that."
"Not only do I believe it, but it is true. It is also true that Julia stole this will. The creature Shorty—Mrs. Parsley's protégé that is—was prowling about the house the night we were all dining there—Christmas Eve, when the poor old man was killed—and swears he saw her enter the library during Barton's absence for a moment. She picked up the will, read it, and pocketed it."
"And how much, pray, did you pay this ruffian for this information?"
"That's my business. You may be quite sure it's worth double what I paid for it."
"How then do you explain it's being in Mrs. Gerald Arkel's work-box?"
"Malice—pure malice on the part of that most malicious of women, Julia Darrow."
"But she could know nothing of there being a false top to the work-box."
"She could know anything—everything. Ask Dicky, and he'll tell you that he showed his mother how the thing worked."