Mademoiselle Brun’s attempt to recover the diamond

Mademoiselle Brun’s attempt to recover the diamond is the trap that turns Anthony Cade’s false lead into a confrontation in the library. As the searcher looks for the hidden jewel, Anthony identifies the figure as the person he has been waiting to expose; Boris then rushes in, and the struggle ends with Mademoiselle Brun dead and her part in Prince Michael’s murder publicly confirmed.

Background and the false lead

The library search belongs to a larger contest over the Herzoslovakian diamond and the concealed identities surrounding Prince Michael’s murder. In the political background, Herzoslovakia’s monarchy had been overthrown after King Nicholas IV and Queen Varaga were killed, and a later effort to restore the monarchy was being organized around Prince Michael. George Lomax explained that supporters of the restoration expected the crown to be offered to Prince Michael, with support from the British government; the proposed arrangement also involved concessions for Herman Isaacstein’s company in return for a loan to help place the prince on the throne.

Prince Michael’s murder changed that succession calculation. When Superintendent Battle raised the question of who would follow him, Lomax identified Prince Nicholas Obolovitch as the probable next heir, and Battle added that Nicholas had recently been believed to be in the United States, raising money on his expectations. These disclosures establish why the murder and the identities of those involved matter beyond the immediate crime: the succession and the proposed restoration are bound up with financial and political plans.

Anthony’s later explanation connects Mademoiselle Brun’s library search to a deliberate deception. He says he supplied a clue about where the diamond really was, knowing that the false French representative, whom Anthony had identified as King Victor in disguise, would want the information passed to an accomplice. The note sent upstairs was for Mademoiselle Brun. By arranging for the message to reach her, Anthony gave her a reason to search while helping keep the others occupied and in the room.

The search in the library

The signal Anthony had been waiting for interrupts an accusation that he himself murdered Prince Michael. Rather than answer the charge with an explanation, he tells the others that the murderer is in the library and moves through the window toward it. The group follows him around the terrace. At the library window, Anthony parts the curtain so they can see inside without immediately interrupting the search.

A dark figure stands beside the bookcase, pulling volumes out and putting them back, intent on the search and carrying a torch. The books and the torch make the scene a concrete consequence of the false clue: the searcher is not merely being discussed as an accomplice but is caught in the act of looking through the library. Anthony has brought the others to the window at the moment when the hidden purpose of the errand becomes visible.

Someone then rushes past the watchers and into the room. The torch falls and goes out; a struggle follows in the darkness. Lord Caterham finds the lights and switches them on, revealing two figures still grappling. The episode changes swiftly from a covert search to an open confrontation, with the diamond serving as bait and the search itself exposing the person who has taken it.

Boris’s confrontation and Mademoiselle Brun’s death

The struggle ends when a pistol goes off and the smaller figure falls. The person left standing is Boris, whom the gathered party recognizes as Prince Michael’s servant. He says that she killed his master and had tried to shoot him; according to his account, he meant to take the pistol away from her, but it fired during the struggle. He attributes the outcome to St Michael’s direction.

The group’s closer inspection establishes the dead woman’s identity. Mademoiselle Brun lies with the pistol still in her hand, and her expression is described as hostile. The discovery resolves the question raised by the dark figure at the bookcase: the searcher is Mademoiselle Brun, not an unidentified intruder. It also makes the attempt to recover the diamond inseparable from the exposure of her role in the murder investigation.

Consequences and narrative significance

Mademoiselle Brun’s attempt fails in its immediate purpose: instead of leaving the library with the diamond, she is discovered there, confronted by Boris, and killed in the ensuing struggle. Her death brings the hidden search into public view and gives Boris an opportunity to identify her as the person who killed Prince Michael. The account presents that accusation as his statement; the group’s discovery independently confirms her identity and the circumstances in which she was found, but the scene itself does not provide a separate investigation of the killing.

The sequence also completes Anthony’s maneuver. The false clue draws Mademoiselle Brun to the bookcase, while the note and the diversion keep the others from immediately leaving the room. Anthony does not simply name a suspect: he arranges for the suspected accomplice to appear at the place where the diamond is being sought. The library, ordinarily a repository of books, becomes a stage on which a concealed political murder and an attempted recovery of the jewel converge.

This confrontation links the diamond plot to the succession crisis without making the two stakes identical. The jewel is what Mademoiselle Brun is searching for, while Boris’s accusation ties her to Prince Michael’s death and thus to the contested future of the throne. Her exposure closes the search at the same moment that it sharpens the larger question of who can claim the crown and who has been manipulating events around it.