Miss Verinder drew me aside, and reverted
instantly to her one all-absorbing interest—he
interest in Mr. Blake.

"How is he now?" she asked. "Is he
nervous? is he out of temper? Do you think it
will succeed? Are you sure it will do no
harm?"

"Quite sure. Come, and see me measure
it out."

"One moment! It is past eleven now. How
long will it be before anything happens?"

"It is not easy to say. An hour perhaps."

"I suppose the room must be dark, as it was
last year?"

"Certainly."

"I shall wait in my bedroom—just as I did
before. I shall keep the door a little way
open. It was a little way open last year. I
will watch the sitting-room door; and the
moment it moves, I will blow out my light. It
all happened in that way, on my birthday
night. And it must all happen again in the
same way, mustn't it?"

"you sure you can control yourself, Miss
Verinder?"

"In his interests, I can do anything!" she
answered fervently.

One look at her face told me that I could
trust her. I addressed myself again to Mr.
Bruff.

"I must trouble you to put your papers
aside for a moment," I said.

"Oh, certainly!" He got up with a start—
as if I had disturbed him at a particularly
interesting place—and followed me to the medicine
chest. There, deprived of the breathless
excitement incidental to the practice of his
profession, he looked at Betteredge—and yawned
wearily.

Miss Verinder joined me with a glass jug of
cold water, which she had taken from a
side-table. "Let me pour out the water," she
whispered. "I must have a hand in it!"

I measured out the forty minims from the
bottle, and poured the laudanum into a
medicine glass. "Fill it till it is three parts full,"
I said, and handed the glass to Miss Verinder.
I then directed Betteredge to lock up the
medicine-chest; informing him that I had
done with it now. A look of unutterable relief
overspread the old servant's countenance. He
had evidently suspected me of a medical design
on his young lady!

After adding the water as I had directed,
Miss Verinder seized a moment—while Betteredge
was locking the chest, and while Mr.
Bruff was looking back at his papers—and
slily kissed the rim of the medicine glass.
"When you give it to him," whispered the
charming girl, "give it to him on that side!"

I took the piece of crystal which was to
represent the Diamond from my pocket, and
gave it to her.

"You must have a hand in this, too," I said.
"You must put it where you put the
Moonstone last year."

She led the way to the Indian cabinet, and
put the mock Diamond into the drawer which
the real Diamond had occupied on the birthday
night. Mr. Bruff witnessed this proceeding,
under protest, as he had witnessed everything
else. But the strong dramatic interest which
the experiment was now assuming, proved (to
my great amusement) to be too much for
Betteredge's capacity of self-restraint. His hand
trembled as he held the candle, and he
whispered anxiously, "Are you sure, miss, it's the
right drawer?"

I led the way out again, with the laudanum
and water in my hand. At the door, I stopped
to address a last word to Miss Verinder.

"Don't be long in putting out the lights," I
said.

"I will put them out at once," she answered.
"And I will wait in my bedroom, with only
one candle alight."

She closed the sitting-room door behind us.
Followed by Mr. Bruff and Betteredge, I went
back to Mr. Blake's room.

We found him moving restlessly from side to
side of the bed, and wondering irritably whether
he was to have the laudanum that night. In
the presence of the two witnesses, I gave him
the dose, and shook up his pillows, and told him
to lie down again quietly and wait.

His bed, provided with light chintz curtains,
was placed, with the head against the wall of
the room, so as to leave a good open space on
either side of it. On one side, I drew the
curtains completely—and in the part of the room
thus screened from his view, I placed Mr. Bruff
and Betteredge, to wait for the result. At the
bottom of the bed, I half drew the curtains—
and placed my own chair at a little distance,
so that I might let him see me or not see me,
speak to me or not speak to me, just as the
circumstances might direct. Having already
been informed that he always slept with a light
in the room, I placed one of the two lighted
candles on a little table at the head of the bed,
where the glare of the light would not strike on
his eyes. The other candle I gave to Mr. Bruff;
the light, in this instance, being subdued by
the screen of the chintz curtains. The window
was open at the top so as to ventilate the room.
The rain fell softly, the house was quiet. It was
twenty minutes past eleven, by my watch,
when the preparations were completed, and I
took my place on the chair set apart at the
bottom of the bed.

Mr. Bruff resumed his papers, with every
appearance of being as deeply interested in
them as ever. But looking towards him now,
I saw certain signs and tokens which told me
that the Law was beginning to lose its hold on
him at last. The suspended interest of the
situation in which we were now placed, was
slowly asserting its influence even on his
unimaginative mind. As for Betteredge,
consistency of principle and dignity of conduct had
become, in his case, mere empty words. He
forgot that I was performing a conjuring trick on
Mr. Franklin Blake; he forgot that I had upset
the house from top to bottom; he forgot that I