"I quite agree with you, Lucian; but some good has come out of this evil, for if things had not been as they are, you and I would never have met."
"Egad! that is true!" said Lucian, kissing her. "It's an ill wind that blows nobody any good."
So Diana played the part of a Good Samaritan towards her stepmother, and helped her to bear the evil of being thrust into prison. Lydia wrote to her father in Paris, but received no reply, and therefore was without a friend in the world save Diana. Later on she was admitted to bail, and Diana took her to the hotel in Kensington, there to wait for the arrival of Mr. Clyne. His absence and silence were both unaccountable.
"I hope nothing is wrong with poppa," wept Lydia. "As a rule, he is always smart in replying, and if he has seen about Ercole's death and my imprisonment in the papers, I'm sure he will be over soon."
While she was thus waiting for her father, and Link in every way was seeking evidence against her, Mrs. Clear received an answer to her message. In the same column of the Daily Telegraph, and in the same cypher, there appeared a message from Wrent that he would meet Mrs. Clear at No. 13 Geneva Square.
Link was delighted when Mrs. Clear showed him this, and rubbed his hands with much pleasure. Affairs were about to be brought to a crisis, and as Link was the moving spirit in the matter, his vanity was sufficiently gratified as to make him quite amiable.
"We've got him this time, Mr. Denzil," he said, with enthusiasm. "You and I and a couple of policemen will go down to that house in Geneva Square—by the front, sir, by the front."
"Mrs. Clear, also?" questioned Lucian, wishing to be enlightened on all points.
"No. She'll come in by the back, down the cellarway, as Wrent expects her to come. Then he'll follow in the same path and walk right into the trap."
"But won't the two be seen climbing over that fence in the daytime?" asked the barrister doubtfully.