“I’m sorry to disappoint you, Miss Kent, but I _have_ got a copy,” he said, with a touch of bitterness in his tone. He walked to the bookcase at one end of the room and reached down the book--a well-worn volume--and placed it before her. The rebuke in his voice was deserved, she felt that. She turned the leaves over quickly, but inspiration seemed to have died, for there was nothing in the sacred volume that marshaled her struggling thoughts. “Is it a text?” asked Angel. She shook her head. “It is--something,” she said. “That sounds vague, doesn’t it? I thought if I had the book in my hand, it would recall everything.” Angel was intently studying the rebus. “Here’s one letter, anyway. You said that, Jimmy?” “The door?” said Jimmy. “Yes, that’s fairly evident. Whatever the word is, its second letter is ‘P.’ You see Reale’s scribbled notes? All these are no good, the other letters are best, I suppose it means; so we can cut out ‘T,’ ‘O,’ and ‘K.’” “The best clue of all,” he went on, “is the notes about the ‘professor.’ You see them: “‘Mem.: To get the professor’s new book on it. Mem.: To do what the professor thinks right. Mem.: To write to professor about----’ Now the questions are: Who is the professor, what is his book, and what did he advise? Reale was in correspondence with him, that is certain; in his desire for accuracy, Reale sought his advice. In all these papers there is no trace of a letter, and if any book exists it is still in Sped--it is still in the place from whence this red envelope came.” The two men exchanged a swift glance. “Yes,” said Angel, as if answering the other’s unspoken thought, “it might be done.” The girl looked from one to the other in doubt. “Does this mean an extra risk?” she asked quietly. “I have not questioned you as to how this red envelope came into your possession, but I have a feeling that it was not obtained without danger.” Angel disregarded Jimmy’s warning frown. He was determined that the better side of his strange friend’s character should be made evident to the girl. “Jimmy faced death in a particularly unpleasant form to secure the packet, Miss Kent,” he said. “Then I forbid any further risk,” she said spiritedly. “I thought I had made it clear that I would not accept favors at your friend’s hands; least of all do I want the favor of his life.” Jimmy heard her unmoved. He had a bitter tongue when he so willed, and he chose that moment. “I do not think you can too strongly impress upon Miss Kent the fact that I am an interested party in this matter,” he said acidly. “As she refused my offer to forego my claim to a share of the fortune, she might remember that my interest in the legacy is at least as great as hers. I am risking what I risk, not so much from the beautifully quixotic motives with which she doubtless credits me, as from a natural desire to help myself.”