The sight of David’s handwriting, the astonishing verification of his own first surmise, the vivid memory of Rose unwillingly showing him the letter and the ring and the photograph she supposed to have been intended for herself, had a very powerful effect on Edmund Grosse.  The whole story was so clear, so well connected, it seemed impossible to doubt it.  Yet he believed in Molly’s innocence without an effort.  What was there to prove that Madame Danterre had not destroyed the will after Nurse Edith copied it?  She had the key and the box within reach, and the dying, again and again, have shown incalculable strength—­far greater than was needed in order to get at the will and burn it while a nurse was absent or asleep.

Again, it was to Larrone’s interest to destroy that will.  They had only Pietrino’s persuasion of Larrone’s integrity to set against the possibility of his having opened the box on his long journey to England, against the possibility of his having read the will, and destroyed it, before he gave the box to Molly.  He would have seen at once not only that his own legacy would be lost, but, what might have more influence with him, he must have seen what a doubtful position he must hold in public opinion if this came to light.  He had been the chief friend and adviser of Madame Danterre, who had paid him lavishly for his medical services from her first coming to Florence, and who had made no secret of the legacy he was to receive at her death.  He had been with her at the last, and was now actually carrying on her gigantic fraud by taking the box to her daughter.  Would it not have been a great temptation to him to destroy the will while he had no fear of discovery rather than put the matter in Molly’s hands?  Lastly came Rose’s subtle feminine suggestion that the will might be in the box but that Molly had never opened it.  Some instinct, some secret fear of painful revelations, might easily have made her shrink from any disclosures as to her mother’s past.  Rose was so often right, and the obvious suggestion, that such a shrinking from knowledge would have been natural to Rose and unnatural to Molly, did not occur to the male mind, always inclined to think of women as mostly alike.

At the same time he was really unwilling to relinquish the role of intermediary.  His thoughts had hardly left the subject since the hour of his talk with Rose, and it was especially absorbing on the day on which Molly was to give a party, to which he was invited—­and invited to meet royalty.  He decided that he must that evening ask his hostess to give him an appointment for a private talk.

Edmund arrived late at Westmoreland House when the party was in full swing.  He paused a moment on the wide marble steps of the well staircase as he saw a familiar face coming across the hall.  It was the English Ambassador in Madrid, just arrived home on leave, as Edmund knew.  He was a handsome grey-haired man of thin, nervous figure, and he sprang lightly to meet his old friend and put his hand on his arm.