"Give me my title, if you please," said the little woman sharply. "Say what you have to say, and go away. I wish to speak with my child--the child of whom you robbed me."
Durban shrugged his stout shoulders and turned away, while Beatrice looked at her mother steadily. Lady Watson was arrayed in a very fashionable dinner-gown worn very low, and her complexion was coloured to match. Her jewels were many and rich, and conspicuous amongst them was the diamond necklace which they had come to take away. She really looked very well in the rose-hued light of the drawing-room, and wonderfully pretty. No one would have thought that she was the mother of this noble, sad girl arrayed in deep black.
"Ten minutes," said Lady Watson, consulting a tiny jewelled watch. "But you can come to-morrow, darling."
"I am going down to Hurstable to-morrow," said her daughter coldly--"to The Camp."
"The horrid place!" said Lady Watson, fastening her glove. "I shall sell it, I think."
"No," said Durban, coming close to her; "you will give it to Miss Beatrice along with the money she inherits from her father."
"She inherits nothing."
"Yes, she does. The money of my dead master was left to you for her use. She was supposed to be dead----"
"That was your fault," burst out Lady Watson savagely.
"And you used the money," went on Durban, as though he had not heard her speak; "but Mr. Alpenny's legacy will provide funds for you to restore the money. There is sufficient to give Miss Beatrice two thousand a year."