“But I cannot believe my senses!”

With unanimous consent Jules, Phinuit and Monk uprose and made for the door, only to find it blocked by the substantial form of a plain citizen with his hands in his pockets and understanding in his eyes.

“Steady, gents!” he counselled coolly.  “Orders are to let everybody in and nobody out without Mr. Lanyard says so.”

For a moment they hung in doubt and consternation, consulting one another with dismayed stares.  Then Phinuit made as if to shoulder the man aside.  But for the sake of the moral effect the latter casually exhibited a pistol; and the moral effect of that was stupendous.  Mr. Phinuit disconsolately slouched back into the room.

Grasping the situation, Eve de Montalais turned to the quartet eyes that glimmered in a face otherwise quite composed.

“But how surprising!” she declared.  “Madame la Comtesse de Lorgnes—­Monsieur Monk—­Mr. Phinuit—­how delightful to see you all again!”

The civility met with inadequate appreciation.

“Nothing could be more opportune,” Lanyard declared; “for it is to this lady, Madame de Montalais, and to these gentlemen that you owe the recovery of your jewels.”

“Truly?”

“As I am telling you.  But for them, their charming hospitality in inviting me to cruise aboard their yacht, but for the assistance they lent me, though sometimes unconsciously, I admit—­I should never have been able to say to you to-day:  Your jewels are in a safe place, madame, immediately at your disposal.”

“But how can I thank them?”

“Well,” said Lanyard, “if you ask me, I think we have detained them long enough, I believe they would be most grateful to be permitted to leave and keep their numerous and pressing appointments elsewhere.”

“I am entirely of your mind, monsieur.”

Lanyard nodded to the man in the doorway—­“All right, Mr. Murray”—­and he stood indifferently aside.

In silence the three men moved to the door and out, Phinuit with a brazen swagger, Jules without emotion visible, Monk with eyebrows adroop and flapping.

But Lanyard interposed when Liane Delorme would have followed.

“A moment, Liane, if you will be so good.”

She paused, regarding him with a sombre and inscrutable face while he produced from his coat-pocket a fat envelope without endorsement.

“This is yours.”

The woman murmured blankly:  “Mine?”

He said in a guarded voice:  “Papers I found in the safe in your library, that night.  I had to take them for use in event of need.  Now...they are useless.  But you are unwise to keep such papers, Liane.  Good-bye.”

The envelope was unsealed.  Lifting the flap, the woman half withdrew the enclosure, recognised it at a glance, and crushed it in a convulsive grasp, while the blood, ebbing swiftly from her face, threw her rouge into livid relief.  For an instant she seemed about to speak, then bowed her head in dumb acknowledgment, and left the room.