“Because you were alone with me in that house of death in Bayswater. It was you who killed the hideous reptile and who severed the bonds which held me. They intended that I should die. My grave had already been prepared. Cannot you tell me the motive of that dastardly attack?” I begged of her.
“Alas! I cannot,” she said. “I warned you when at Gardone that I knew what was intended, but of the true motive I was, and am still, entirely ignorant. Their motives are always hidden ones.”
“They endeavoured to get from me another thousand pounds,” I exclaimed.
“It is well that you did not give it to them. The result would have been just the same. They intended that you should die, fearing lest you should inform the police.”
“And you were outside the bank with Forbes when he cashed my cheque!” I remarked in slow tones.
“I know,” she answered hoarsely. “I know that you must believe me to be their associate, perhaps their accomplice. Ah! well. Judge me, Mr. Biddulph, as you will. I have no defence. Only recollect that I warned you to go into hiding—to efface yourself—and you would not heed. You believed that I only spoke wildly—perhaps that I was merely an hysterical girl, making all sorts of unfounded assertions.”
“I believed, nay, I knew, Miss Pennington, that you were my friend. You admitted in Gardone that you were friendless, and I offered you the friendship of one who, I hope, is an honest man.”
“Ah! thank you!” she cried, taking my hand warmly in hers. “You have been so very generous, Mr. Biddulph, that I can only thank you from the bottom of my heart. It is true an attempt was made upon you, but you fortunately escaped, even though they secured a thousand pounds of your money. Yet, had you taken my advice and disappeared, they would soon have given up the chase.”
“Tell me,” I urged in deep earnestness, “others have been entrapped in that dark house—have they not? That mechanical chair—that devilish invention—was not constructed for me alone.”
She did not answer, but I regarded her silence as an affirmative response.