The detective's voice broke the silence.
"Julie Fournereau," he said in French, advancing a few steps towards her, "in the name of the law I arrest you for the murder of Reginald Thorne at Nice."
"I am innocent!" she cried hoarsely, her haggard eyes glaring at us with a hunted look in them. "I tell you I am quite innocent!"
"Listen," said Ernest, in a firm tone, although there was a slight catch in his voice, which showed how greatly excited he was. "The reasons which have led me to this step are briefly these. Last December, while living here in Paris, I went south to spend the winter at Monte Carlo. I stayed at the 'Metropole,' and amid the cosmopolitan crowd there met the woman before you. One day there arrived at the same hotel, from Paris, my friend Reginald Thorne, whom I knew well in London, but who had lived in Paris for the past year. We were about together during the day, and in the Rooms that evening he encountered me walking beside this woman Fournereau. That same night he came to my room, and in confidence related to me a story which at the moment I regarded as somewhat exaggerated, namely, that he had been induced to frequent a certain gaming-house in Paris, where he had lost almost everything he possessed, and how he had ultimately discovered that an elaborate system of sharping had been practised upon him by the woman and her male accomplices. That woman, he told me, had left Paris suddenly just at the moment when he discovered the truth, and he had encountered her in the Rooms with me. Her name was Julie Fournereau."
I glanced at the wretched woman before us. Her wild eyes were fixed upon the carpet; her fingers were twitching with intense agitation; her breath came and went in short quick gasps. Ernest, in his exposure, was merciless.
"Had she seen him in the Rooms?" I inquired.
"Yes," he answered. "We had come face to face. He told me that, as he had been robbed of nearly all he possessed, he was determined to give information against her. She was, he told me, an associate of bad characters in Paris, and urged me to cut her acquaintance. His story was strange and rather romantic, for he gave me to understand that this woman had made a pretence of loving him, and had induced him to play in her house, with the result that he lost large sums to a certain man who was her accomplice. Personally, I was not very much charmed with her," Ernest went on, glancing at me. "She was evidently, as Thorne had declared, acquainted with many of the worst characters who frequent Monte Carlo, and I began to think seriously that my own reputation would be besmirched by being seen constantly in her company. Still, I tried to dissuade my friend from endeavouring to wreak justice upon such a person, arguing that, as he had lost the money in a private gaming establishment, he had no remedy in law. But he was young and headstrong—possibly suffering from a fit of jealousy. After several days, however, fearing that he might create a scene with this notorious woman, I at last induced him to go over to Nice and stay at the 'Grand.' While there, curiously enough, he met the lady who is here present, Miss Rosselli, and at once fell deeply in love with her."
"No," I protested, in quick indignation, "there was no love whatever between us. That I strongly deny."
"Carmela," he said, bestowing on me a calm and serious look. "In this affair I must speak plainly and openly. I myself have a confession to make."
"Of what?"