When he had finished she said:

"No attempt to recover the lost jewels, the desertion of Paris, the
sudden change into old age! What do you make of it?"

"I can make nothing. Unless the chagrin she felt made her throw up
everything in a fit of anger. And then, of course, once the thing was
done she couldn't go back."

"You mean--go back to the Edwardian youthfulness she had abandoned?"

"Yes. One may refuse to grow old, but once one has become definitely,
ruthlessly old, it's practically impossible to jump back to a pretence
of the thirties."

"Of course. It would frighten people. But--it wasn't that."

"No?"

"No. For if she had felt the loss of her jewels so much as you suggest,
she would have made every effort to recover them."

"I suppose she would."

"The heart of the mystery lies in her not wishing to try to get the
jewels back. That, to me, is inexplicable. Because we women love jewels.
And no woman carries about jewels worth fifty thousand pounds without
caring very much for them."

"Just what I have thought," said Craven.