She had gone up to him and was looking up into his eyes, which had become glassy and blood-shot, but after a moment's awful pause he turned from her with a little gesture of disbelief.
"Good God!" he muttered. "To accuse—her—of that!"
"It is true! I swear to you it is true!" cried Jessica, desperately. "It was she who accused you to the detective whom she sent to discover proof of your crime. She told him that you loved her, that you had killed your best friend in order that you might steal his promised wife from him. She sent Edmond Stolliker there, had the body of Olney Winthrop exhumed, and discovered that you had lied, that he had not been shot, but had been suffocated in a mine!"
Pierrepont groaned.
She paused just long enough to allow her words full force, then continued rapidly:
"She detained you by her side by every means at her avail until Stolliker should obtain such proof as was necessary for your conviction, and while he was there seeking it, paying thousands of dollars for it if necessary, for she had put her entire fortune at his command, Manuel Meriaz came here. You remember the evening at our house? You and he left the drawing-room together. She left the poker-table and followed. She listened to your conversation from behind a portière that screens the library from an anteroom, and the following day she sent for Meriaz. She purchased from him a story, bought it with gold, of how you had gone for a walk with Olney, and when you were in a lonely and deserted place, you had pushed him down the old Donato Mine, where he was suffocated with the gases before any one could go to his assistance. She had him make affidavit to this, and sent it to Stolliker in Mexico. On this story he has obtained papers of extradition, and will arrest you tonight."
"And Carlita has done this?"
"She has."
"But less than a week ago she offered five thousand dollars to the man who would save my life!"