Kells always at this hour had a dampening effect upon his followers.
More and more he drew aloof from them, yet he never realized that.
He might have been alone. But often he glanced out of the door, and
appeared to listen. Of course he expected Jim Cleve to return, but
what did he expect of him? Joan had a blind faith that Jim would be
cunning enough to fool Kells and Pearce. So much depended upon it!

Some of the bandits uttered an exclamation. Then silently, like a
shadow, Jim Cleve entered.

Joan's heart leaped and seemed to stand still. Jim could not have
locked more terrible if he were really a murderer. He opened his
coat. Then he flung a black object upon the table and it fell with a
soft, heavy, sodden thud. It was a leather belt packed with gold.

When Kells saw that he looked no more at the pale Cleve. His
clawlike hand swept out for the belt, lifted and weighed it.
Likewise the other bandits, with gold in sight, surged round Kells,
forgetting Cleve.

"Twenty pounds!" exclaimed Kells, with a strange rapture in his
voice.

"Let me heft it?" asked Pearce, thrillingly.

Joan saw and heard so much, then through a kind of dimness, that she
could not wipe away, her eyes beheld Jim. What was the awful thing
that she interpreted from his face, his mien? Was this a part he was
playing to deceive Kells? The slow-gathering might of her horror
came with the meaning of that gold-belt. Jim had brought back the