hidden hand.

"You see," the airy little being went on, in her light way, "I
have some awfully funny tricks. I am always being scolded for
them, but somehow I don't improve. One is to keep my jewelry
bright with a strange foreign paste an old Frenchwoman once gave
me in Paris. It's of a vivid red, and stains the fingers
dreadfully if you don't take care. Not even water will take it
off, see mine. I used that paste on my pendant last night just
after you left me, and being awfully sleepy I didn't stop to rub
it off. If your finger-tips are not red, you never touched the
pendant, Miss Driscoll. Oh, see! They are as white as milk.

"But some one took the sapphires, and I owe that person a
scolding, as well as myself. Was it you, Miss Hughson? You, Miss
Yates? or--" and here she paused before Miss West, "Oh, you have
your gloves on! You are the guilty one!" and her laugh rang out
like a peal of bells, robbing her next sentence of even a
suggestion of sarcasm. "Oh, what a sly-boots!" she cried. "How
you have deceived me! Whoever would have thought you to be the
one to play the mischief!"

Who indeed! Of all the five, she was the one who was considered
absolutely immune from suspicion ever since the night Mrs.
Barnum's handkerchief had been taken, and she not in the box.
Eyes which had surveyed Miss Driscoll askance now rose in wonder
toward hers, and failed to fall again because of the stoniness
into which her delicately-carved features had settled.

"Miss West, I know you will be glad to remove your gloves; Miss