McIntyre interrupted his daughter with a hasty gesture, and addressed his wife. “When Detective Ferguson questioned me as to your reason for being in the library, Margaret, I stated you had gone down to get a book left lying on the Venetian casket,” he said. “I waited for you to volunteer an explanation of your presence there, but you never made any.”
“I went down to get our marriage certificate.” Margaret forgot the presence of others and spoke only to him, the love-light in her eyes pleading against the censure she dreaded, as she made her brief confession. “Mr. Clymer sent me a note, inclosing a canceled check, stating the bank officials had decided my signature was a forgery. The check was drawn to Barbara, and on examining it I noticed the peculiar formation of the letter 'B'; it is characteristic of your handwriting and Helen's.” She paused, and added:
“I was at a loss what to think. I knew you and Helen wrote alike; Helen's extraordinary behavior to me led me to believe that perhaps she had been short of funds, and forged my name to a check in desperation. Then I remembered seeing you, Charles, open the box containing my aconitine pills, the box's disappearance, and Jimmie's death from that poison”—she raised her hands in an expressive gesture. “Although my reason told me that you might be guilty, my loyalty and love refuted the accusation.”
“Margaret!” McIntyre's voice shook with emotion; then controlling himself he turned to Sylvester. “I presume this check was some more of your deviltry?”
Helen answered for the clerk. Removing a soiled paper from her bag she laid it on Kent's desk. “This note was handed to me by Grimes,” she explained. “It reads: 'Helen, please cash this check and give money to Mrs. Brewster's dressmaker. Father.' I followed the instructions.”
“And gave the money to my sister,” Sylvester chuckled at their surprise. “My sister was taught in a French convent, and she is an excellent seamstress, when she isn't drunk, as Mrs. McIntyre knows.”
“See here, Sylvester,” Clymer broke his long silence. “You were in the police court on a charge of assault and battery brought by your wife on Tuesday morning, and you were in the prisoner's cage at the moment Turnbull died. How then was it possible for you to be at the McIntyre's at midnight on Monday?”
“I was out on bail and appeared in the courtroom just in time for my trial,” Sylvester explained. “I did not have to sit in the cage, but recognizing Turnbull I went there to be with him.”
Kent placed the forged check bearing Margaret Brewster's signature on the desk. “I take it this check is your work, Sylvester,” he said. “You reaped the benefit by having the money paid to your sister. Did you also have the fake telegram delivered to me stating Mr. Rochester was in Cleveland?”
“I faked that,” broke in Rochester, before the clerk could make a disclaimer. “I thought it best to disappear for a few days down in Virginia, where I could think things over in peace.”