“It is not what I say, it is what the law says; what the dead men’s wills say; what the Lord Chancellor himself would say if he were asked. You are a person accustomed to do whatever you like and to bewitch any man who approaches you, but you will find there are some things stronger than yourself, and one of them is the common law of England, which in this instance is dead against you.”
With these words he rose.
Then, with one of those audacious inspirations which might have made her a great general had she been a man, she added between her teeth—
“Perhaps you would like to see them and convince yourself of their safety? Will you come to my room? The safe is screwed to its stand.”
She spoke without apprehension because she knew that the false diamonds would defy detection by anyone except an expert. Hurstmanceaux was reassured by the frankness of the offer.
“No, oh, no!” he said less coldly. “I will of course take your word for it that they are all there.”
“You are really too confiding,” said his sister very contemptuously. She rose also with tightened teeth, dilated nostrils, flashing eyes. “Your conduct is infamous! To insult your own sister!”
“There is no insult,” said Hurstmanceaux. “An honest woman would not want to be asked twice to give up what is not her own.”
“Out of my presence!” she cried with a shrill sound in her voice like that of the wind as it rises in storm.
“With pleasure,” said her brother very coldly. “To-morrow is Sunday. On Monday at ten o’clock in the morning they will come from the bank for the jewels, and you will consult your own interests best by giving them up without more of this folly; we shall have them valued afresh by Hunt and Roskell, for values change with time.”