“The game’s up, Ryder,” said Holmes quietly.  “Hold up, man, or you’ll be into the fire!  Give him an arm back into his chair, Watson.  He’s not got blood enough to go in for felony with impunity.  Give him a dash of brandy.  So!  Now he looks a little more human.  What a shrimp it is, to be sure!”

For a moment he had staggered and nearly fallen, but the brandy brought a tinge of colour into his cheeks, and he sat staring with frightened eyes at his accuser.

“I have almost every link in my hands, and all the proofs which I could possibly need, so there is little which you need tell me.  Still, that little may as well be cleared up to make the case complete.  You had heard, Ryder, of this blue stone of the Countess of Morcar’s?”

“It was Catherine Cusack who told me of it,” said he in a crackling voice.

“I see—­her ladyship’s waiting-maid.  Well, the temptation of sudden wealth so easily acquired was too much for you, as it has been for better men before you; but you were not very scrupulous in the means you used.  It seems to me, Ryder, that there is the making of a very pretty villain in you.  You knew that this man Horner, the plumber, had been concerned in some such matter before, and that suspicion would rest the more readily upon him.  What did you do, then?  You made some small job in my lady’s room—­you and your confederate Cusack—­and you managed that he should be the man sent for.  Then, when he had left, you rifled the jewel-case, raised the alarm, and had this unfortunate man arrested.  You then—­”

Ryder threw himself down suddenly upon the rug and clutched at my companion’s knees.  “For God’s sake, have mercy!” he shrieked.  “Think of my father!  Of my mother!  It would break their hearts.  I never went wrong before!  I never will again.  I swear it.  I’ll swear it on a Bible.  Oh, don’t bring it into court!  For Christ’s sake, don’t!”

“Get back into your chair!” said Holmes sternly.  “It is very well to cringe and crawl now, but you thought little enough of this poor Horner in the dock for a crime of which he knew nothing.”

“I will fly, Mr. Holmes.  I will leave the country, sir.  Then the charge against him will break down.”

“Hum!  We will talk about that.  And now let us hear a true account of the next act.  How came the stone into the goose, and how came the goose into the open market?  Tell us the truth, for there lies your only hope of safety.”

Ryder passed his tongue over his parched lips.  “I will tell you it just as it happened, sir,” said he.  “When Horner had been arrested, it seemed to me that it would be best for me to get away with the stone at once, for I did not know at what moment the police might not take it into their heads to search me and my room.  There was no place about the hotel where it would be safe.  I went out, as if on some commission, and I made for my sister’s house.  She had married a man named Oakshott, and lived in Brixton Road, where she