detective," Henson sneered. "Miss Lee."

Littimer smiled. It was good, after all, to defeat and hoodwink
the rascal.

"Miss Chris Henson," he said. "It never occurred to you that Miss Chris
and Miss Lee were one and the same person. You never guessed. And she
played with you as if you had been a child. How beautifully she exposed
you over those pictures. Ah, you should have seen your face when you saw
the stolen Rembrandt back again in its place. And after that you were mad
enough to think that I trusted you. My dear, what shall we do with this
pretty fellow?"

Lady Littimer shook her head doubtfully. It was plain that the presence
of Henson disturbed her. There was just a suggestion of the old madness
in her eyes.

"Send him away," she said. "Let him go."

"Send him away by all means," Littimer went on. "But letting him go is
another matter. If we do the police will pick him up on other charges.
There is a certain consolation in knowing that his evil career is likely
to be shortened by some years. But I shall have no mercy. Scotland Yard
shall know everything."

There was a cold ring in Littimer's voice that told Henson of his
determination to carry out his threat. The other troubles he might
wriggle out of, but this one was terribly real. It was time to try
conciliation.

"It will be a terrible scandal for the family, my lord," he whined.

Littimer rose to his feet. A sudden anger flared into his eyes. He was a
smaller man than Henson, but the latter cowed before him.

"You dog!" he cried. "What greater scandal than that of the past few
years? Does not all the world know that there is, or has been, some heavy
cloud over the family honour? Lord and Lady Littimer have parted, and her
ladyship has gone away. That is only part of what the gossips have said.
And in these domestic differences it is always the woman who suffers.
Everybody always says that the woman has done something wrong. For years
my wife has been under this stigma. If she had chosen to keep before the
world after she left me most people would have ignored her. And you talk
to me of a family scandal!"

"You will only make bad worse, my lord."

"No," Littimer cried. "I am going to make bad infinitely better. We come
together again, but we say nothing of the past. And the world sneers and
says the past is ignored for politic considerations. And so the public
is going to know the truth, you dog. The whole facts of the case have
gone to my solic