"Yes, yes. Go at once!"
The face of Beatrice was aglow with joy, and she went with her lover to the great gates, which now usually stood wide open. And she had every cause for joy. They now knew that Waterloo was the assassin who had murdered old Alpenny. Vivian was guiltless, and so was Durban, who, to save the tears of his young mistress, had so nobly taken upon himself the burden of shame. When Vivian departed post-haste to see the village constable, and to put all things in train for the capture of Major Ruck and his accomplices, Beatrice walked to and fro much excited.
"Dear Durban, good Durban!" she murmured again and again. "What a friend he has been to me! But there will be no need for this sacrifice. Vivian's character can be cleared, and then----" She hesitated, and wondered again if Major Ruck could fulfil his promise and remove the obstacle to her marriage with Vivian. She could not think of how this could be done, save by the death of Maud Paslow; and yet she did not think that Ruck, villain as he was, would kill a woman. All the same, he had certainly killed Alpenny through the instrumentality of Waterloo. "I must give Major Ruck the necklace in any case," said Beatrice, quite forgetting that when Vivian told the police, Ruck would need no necklace and would be in the dock. She went to her bedroom-carriage and got out the necklace, which flashed bravely in the sun. It was certainly a magnificent ornament, and Beatrice was woman enough to regret parting with it, especially to such a scamp as the Major. However, as she recollected Vivian's errand, it might be that it would not need to be given up. "But then," she thought, "if Major Ruck is arrested, he will certainly not forward my marriage with Vivian, as out of revenge he will hold his tongue."
With the necklace in her hand, she went across to the counting-house carriage in order to make a packet of it and seal it up. The place was chill and dismal in its desolation. Beatrice closed the door and seated herself at the desk, looking about for a sufficiently thick sheet of paper in which to wrap the jewel. Hardly had she found one when she heard a grating noise, and turned her head to see the sheet of galvanised tin, upon which stood the stove, slip aside. The next moment, and she saw the red head of Waterloo protrude from the hole.
"You!" cried Beatrice, starting to her feet, and her blood ran cold when she thought of what the reptile had done.
"Yuss," said Waterloo, who looked haggard and white. "The Major is after me. I cut away from Stepney when the plaice was raided by the perlice. The Major cove got away too, and has been follering me. He come down by the saime train----"
"He is here?" cried Beatrice interrogatively, bending forward.
She had the necklace dangling from her hand, and in bending down it was brought within reach of Waterloo. He snatched at it at once and growled like a dog over a bone. "Yuss," he said hoarsely, while the girl remained paralysed by his sudden move; "he's after this, and me. He's goin' to kill me, becas I set the peelers on to the Gang. But he'll not come by this passage, and I'll slip away. Don't you give the alarm, miss, or I'll cut your throat."
"The same as you did Mr. Alpenny's?"
"Ho! you knows that, does you?" yelped Waterloo. "Yuss, I did; an' I'll kill you if----"