"I suppose a lie more or less makes no difference to an expert like yourself," Enid went on, with cold contempt. "You took advantage of my aunt's misfortunes. Ah, she is a different woman since Lord Littimer came here. But her sorrow has crushed her down, and that forgery of the ring you dangled before her eyes deceived her."
"I never showed her the ring," Henson said, brazenly.
"And you can look me in the face and say that? One night Lady Littimer snatched it from you and ran into the garden. You followed and struggled for the ring. And Mr. David Steel, who stood close by, felled you to the earth with a blow on the side of your head. I wonder he didn't kill you. I should have done so in his place. And yet it would be a pity to hang anyone for your death. See here!"
Enid produced the ring from her pocket. Lord Littimer looked at it intently.
"Have you seen this before, my dear?" he asked his wife.
"Many a time," Lady Littimer said, sadly. "Take it away, it reminds me of too many bitter memories. Take it out of my sight."
"An excellent forgery," Littimer murmured. "A forgery calculated to deceive many experts even. I will compare it with the original by and by."
Henson listened with a sinking feeling at his heart. Was it possible, he wondered, that Lord Littimer had really recovered the original? He had had hopes of getting it back even now, and making it the basis of terms of surrender. Lady Littimer snatched the ring from Littimer's grasp and threw it through the open window into the garden.
She stood up facing Henson, her head thrown back, her eyes flaming with a new resolution. It seemed hardly possible to believe that this fine, handsome woman with the white hair could be the poor demented creature that the others once had known.
"Reginald Henson, listen to me," she cried. "For your own purpose you cruelly and deliberately set out to wreck the happiness of several lives. For mere money you did this; for sheer love of dissipation you committed this crime. You nearly deprived me of my reason. I say nothing about the money, because that is nothing by comparison. But the years that are lost can never come back to me again. When I think of the past and the past of my poor, unhappy boy I feel that I have no forgiveness for you. If you—Oh, go away; don't stay here—go. If I had known you were coming I should have forbidden you the house. Your mere presence unnerves me. Littimer, send him away."