"To refuse her request would be at once to mortify and aggrieve her; to accede to it and give her the fifty dollars she asked – a sum, by the way, I could not well spare – would be to encourage an action, easily pardoned once, but which if repeated would lead to unpleasant complications, to say the least. The third course of informing her father of what she needed I did not even consider, for I knew him well enough to be sure that nothing but pain to her would be the result. I therefore compromised the affair by enclosing the money in a letter in which I told her that I comprehended her difficulty and sent with pleasure the amount she needed, but that as a friend I must add that while in the present instance she had run no risk of being misunderstood or unkindly censured, that such a request made to another man and under other circumstances might provoke a surprise capable of leading to the most unpleasant consequences, and advised her if she ever again found herself in such a strait to appeal directly to her father, or else to deny herself a charity which she was in no position to bestow.
"This letter I undertook to deliver myself, for one of the curious points of her communication had been the entreaty that I would not delay the help she needed by trusting the money to any hand but my own, but would bring it to a certain hotel down town, and place it at the beginning of the book of Isaiah in the large Bible I would find lying on a side table in the small parlor off the main one. She would seek it there before the morning was over, and so, without the intervention of a third party, acquire the means she desired for helping a poor and deserving family.
"I knew the hotel she mentioned, and I remembered the room, but I did not remember the Bible. However, it was sure to be in the place she indicated, and though I was not in much sympathy with my errand, I respected her whim, and carried the letter down town. I had reached Main Street, and was in sight of the hotel designated, when suddenly, on an opposite corner of the street, I saw the young girl herself. She looked as fresh as the morning, and smiled so gayly I felt somewhat repaid for the annoyance she had caused me; and, gratified that I could cut matters short by putting the letter directly in her hand, I crossed the street to her side. As soon as we were face to face, I said:
"'How fortunate I am to meet you. Here is the amount you need sealed up in this letter. You see I had it all ready.'
"The face she lifted to mine wore so blank a look that I paused astonished.
"'What do you mean?' she asked, her eyes looking straight into mine with such innocence in their clear blue depths I was at once convinced she knew nothing of the matter with which my thoughts were busy. 'I am very glad to see you, but I do not in the least understand what you mean by the amount I need,' and she glanced at the letter I held out with an air of distrust mingled with curiosity.
"I could not explain myself. If she had been made the victim of a conspiracy to procure money from me, it would not help to preserve that sweet innocence of hers to know it. So, with a laugh, I put the letter in my pocket, saying:
"'You cut me short in my efforts to do a charitable action. I heard, no matter how, that you were interested just now in a destitute family, and took this way of assisting you in their behalf.'
"Her blue eyes opened wider. 'The poor are always with us,' she replied; 'but I know of no special family just now that requires any such help as you intimate. If I did, papa would give me what assistance I needed.'
"I was greatly pleased to hear her say this, for I am very fond of my young friend, but I was deeply indignant also against the unknown person who had taken advantage of my regard for this young girl to force money from me. I, therefore, did not linger at her side, but, after due apologies, hastened immediately here, where there is a man employed who, to my knowledge, had once been a trusted member of the police.
"Telling him no more of the story than was necessary to insure his co-operation in the plan I had formed to discover the author of this fraud, I extracted the bank-notes from the letter I had written, and put in their place stiff pieces of manilla paper. Taking the envelope so filled to the hotel already alluded to, I placed it at the opening chapters of Isaiah in the Bible as described. There was no one in either of the rooms when I went in, and I encountered only a bell-boy as I came out; but at the door I ran against a young man whom I strictly forbore to recognize, but whom I knew to be my improvised detective coming to take his stand in some place where he could watch the parlor, and note who went into it.
"At noon I returned to the hotel, passed immediately to the small parlor, and looked into the Bible. The letter was gone. Coming out of the room, I was at once joined by my detective.
"'Has the letter been taken?' he eagerly inquired.
"I nodded.
"His brows wrinkled and he looked both troubled and perplexed.
"'I don't understand it,' he remarked, 'I've seen every one who has gone into that room since you left it, but I do not know now any more than before who took the letter. You see,' he continued, as I looked at him sharply, 'I had to remain out here. If I had gone even into the large room the Bible would not have been disturbed nor the letter either, so in the hope of knowing the rogue at sight, I strolled about this hall and kept my eye constantly on that door, but – '
"He looked embarrassed and stopped.
"'You say the letter is gone?' he suggested, after a moment.
"'Yes,' I returned.
"He shook his head. 'Nobody went into that room or came out of it,' he went on, 'whom you would have wished me to follow. I should have thought myself losing time if I had taken one step after any one of them.'
"'But who did go into that room?' I urged, impatient at his perplexity.
"'Only three persons this morning,' he returned. 'You know them all.' And he mentioned first Mrs. Couldock."
Taylor, who was lending me the superficial attention of a pre-occupied man, smiled frankly at the utterance of this name. "Of course she had nothing to do with such a debasing piece of business," he observed.
"Of course not," I repeated. "Nor does it seem likely that Miss Dawes could have been concerned in it either. Yet my detective told me that she was the next person who went into the parlor."
"I do not know Miss Dawes so well," remarked Taylor carelessly.
"But I do," said I, "and I would as soon suspect my sister of a dishonorable act as this noble, self-sacrificing woman."
"The third person?" suggested Taylor.
I got up and crossed the floor. When my back was to him I said quietly:
"Was Mrs. Walworth."
The silence that followed was very painful. I did not dare to break it, and he doubtless found himself unable to do so. It must have been five minutes before either of us spoke, then he suddenly cried:
"Where is that detective, as you call him? I want to see him."
"Let me see him for you," said I. "I should hardly wish Sudley, discreet as I consider him, to know you had any interest in this affair."
Taylor rose and came to where I stood.
"You believe," said he, "that she, the woman I am about to marry, is the one who wrote you that infamous letter?"
I faced him quite frankly. "I do not feel ready to acknowledge that," I replied. "One of those three women took my letter from out the Bible where I placed it; which of them wrote the lines that provoked it, I do not dare conjecture. You say it was not Mrs. Couldock. I say it was not Miss Dawes, but – "
He broke in upon me impetuously.
"Have you the letter?" he asked.