"Because I thought it was lost. If the cross belonged to your sister Kate, Mrs. Walker, I knew her."
"She was not your wife," cried Mrs. Walker savagely, "You were not the man she ran away with."
"I never said that I was," rejoined Hale coolly. "No. Hear what I have to say. When I was living at Wimbledon with my wife--Lesbia's mother--we one day found a woman unconscious in the snow. My wife, who was a Good Samaritan, revived her and took her in. She died, but before drawing her last breath, she told me that she was Katherine Morse----"
"That was my sister's maiden name. But she married the man she ran away with."
"She never told me so," said Hale coolly. "She died in my wife's arms and is buried in Wimbledon cemetery. The cross--as I heard from my wife on her death-bed--she gave to my wife saying that if produced to Mr. Simon Jabez it would be worth fifty thousand pounds. My wife gave the cross to Bridget and did not tell me so. When she died I hunted for the cross and could not find it. But that old hag of an Irishwoman possessed it and held her peace. On her death-bed she gave it to Lesbia and told her not to tell me about it. I only became aware of its whereabouts when I saw it in your son's hand after he had proposed to Lesbia. Then it was lost again and I don't know who has it."
"What a strange story!" said Lesbia, "why did you not tell me before, father?"
Hale turned on her viciously. "You were secret with me about the cross, so what occasion was there to tell you? Had you been open I would have had that fifty thousand pounds long ago."
"No," said Jabez, who had been listening attentively, "you were not married to Miss Katherine Morse, and so had no claim to the money."
"I claim it," cried Mrs. Walker triumphantly, "all I wanted to know was whether my sister Kate was dead. Now you have sworn to that, and now that we know she is buried in Wimbledon cemetery, I get the money."
"No," said Jabez again and very drily.