"Well," continued the girl, "dad is poor, and wants money. He hoped to get it by making me marry Sir Hector. But as I did not become Lady and as I never can be owing to the death, dad is in a hole."
"My dear Claudia, I really don't know what you mean?"
"I'm just coming to the point now," said the girl, nervously, and her lips quivered. "You know that dad went down to ask Sir Hector why he had postponed the marriage?"
"Yes. Did he receive an explanation?"
"No. Sir Hector was about to give him one when the ring came at the door, and Sir Hector went down to see the man who murdered him."
"He might not have murdered him," murmured Craver looking down at his cup.
"Nonsense! Why should he have fled if he was innocent?" said Claudia, hurriedly. "But let that pass, Edwin. The point is that dad did not get an explanation; but somehow he has got it into his head that Sir Hector may have left me the money by will."
"On what grounds does he believe that?"
"I can't tell you. He did not say. But to-day he has gone to see Mr. Sandal in Lincoln's Inn Field, who is Sir Hector's lawyer. And when he left this very room." continued Claudia, sinking her voice to a frightened whisper, "he said that he had risked his reputation, his liberty, and his life to get money."
Craver looked hard at the girl, and seemed to be about as nervous as she was herself. "Did he say that, he had risked so much to get this particular money of Sir Hector's?"