In the same quiet way she went on, seeming to see nothing extraordinary in the patient contrivance by which she had outwitted the schemer who most probably looked down upon her as a simple piece of domestic furniture. In the cupboard she had found a mass of correspondence, by no means all of it from women, but in almost every case containing painful and sometimes hideous revelations of depraved and distorted natures. The horrified woman had been obliged to leave a good deal unread. The letters from each correspondent were neatly kept on a separate file, marked with the number under which he or she wrote. These numbers puzzled her at first, as they puzzled Tarleton himself, but she had only to ask Miss Sebright for the explanation. Several numbers were missing from the series. Either the writers must have redeemed their rash confessions, or else they had gone abroad or died, and the papers had become valueless. The real difficulty before Mrs. Neobard had been to keep her promise to Miss Sebright without the doctor’s knowing that his cupboard had been opened. Now she saw her way. If the poor victim defied him and he went to look for her file and found it gone, he would probably think he had destroyed it himself by mistake. “He wasn’t always sober when he came in at night,” the unfortunate wife said in a tone that breathed of her past sufferings. “I felt sure he couldn’t suspect me or anyone of taking one set of letters and leaving all the rest. Anyhow, I decided to risk it. I took Miss Sebright’s letters and sent them to her by registered post. She wrote thanking me very gratefully, but telling me that she was dying and asking me to go and see her. I went more than once. It was the sight of her sinking into her grave under my husband’s cruelty that nerved me to go on.” “I should have returned all the other letters now, without caring what happened, if I had known where to send them. But I had no key to whom the numbers stood for.” “You would have found that if you had looked in Dr. Weathered’s appointment-book,” Sir Frank told her. The widow opened her eyes. “I never thought of that! I see you know how to find out everything, Sir Frank. Stop me if I am telling you anything you know already.” The consultant waved his hand courteously for her to go on. Her story had held one surprise for him already, and he foresaw that others were to come. “I waited. I now went to the cupboard every day when I knew I was safe from interruption, to read any fresh letters that had arrived, in the hope of finding something in them that would give me a clue to the writer’s identity. At last I found one in which the writer had put her address at the head in the usual way. I suppose she did it in forgetfulness.” Tarleton breathed softly while he waited for the name he was pretty certain of hearing.