"I don't quite follow you," said Gilbert. "Why did you tell my father at all?"
"Because I wished him, being so friendly with Thornton, to hold Morris off until that negotiation was complete. Do you not understand? Suppose Thornton had come before my plans were ripe and asked for that examination, I believed your father would have been able to have stood him off for some time--long enough for me to get that matter settled to my liking. Now, do you see?"
"Yes," said Gilbert, dryly, any pity he had felt for Silwood disappearing as he listened to this heartless statement. "What was this important negotiation of which you speak?"
"I had sold some acres of land to a contractor, who had paid a heavy price for them," said Silwood, now speaking with the indifference of a man who is telling a story that has no longer any interest for him; "but I had to be content with getting half the price in cash and half in the form of a bill. The total amount was thirty thousand pounds, the bill was for fifteen thousand, and when we heard from Thornton it still had some time to run. I did not discount the bill, but put it in a chamber in that large japanned box you may remember seeing in my room."
"Did you not go one night to New Square not long ago, and open it?"
"Yes; you know that! I went to get the bill--it was due next day."
"I see. Well, you left the secret chamber open, and that showed us you were not dead, and put us on your track."
"The spring would not work," he said. "It had baffled me very nearly once or twice before, but that time it baffled me altogether. So! so! I understand now why you came to St. Paul--it was the secret chamber which gave me away, which has brought me here."
"Yes; I went to Italy," said Gilbert, "and Ucelli confessed the conspiracy you and he had entered into. He it was who told me that you and James Russell were one. James Russell was tracked to Liverpool, then to New York, and then to St. Paul."
"What a pity I did not leave that bill alone!" said Silwood, quite calmly. "But I could not think of leaving fifteen thousand pounds behind me. That," he added, "you will find with the rest."
"Certainly, as James Russell, to whom it was payable."
"How in the world," interjected Gilbert, "shall we be able to put all these matters right?"
