She shone on me through her happy tears. "What happiness--what consolation you have brought my poor mother! This will take the bitterness from her grief. And that it should come to her now! Do you know, she had a presentiment of it? When we heard of the Duke's flight her first word was: 'Now we may find Emilio's letter.' At heart she was always sure that he had written--I suppose some blessed instinct told her so." She dropped her face on her hands, and I saw her tears fall on the wretched letter. In a moment she looked up again, with eyes that blessed and trusted me. "Tell me where you found it," she said. I told her. "Oh, the savages! They took it from him--" My opportunity had come. "No," I said, "it appears they did _not_ take it from him." "Then how--" I waited a moment. "The letter," I said, looking full at her, "was given up to the warder of the prison by the son of Doctor Briga." She stared, repeating the words slowly. "The son of Doctor Briga? But that is--Fernando," she said. "I have always understood," I replied, "that your friend was an only son." I had expected an outcry of horror; if she had uttered it I could have forgiven her anything. But I heard, instead, an incredulous exclamation: my statement was really too preposterous! I saw that her mind had flashed back to our last talk, and that she charged me with something too nearly true to be endurable. "My brother's letter? Given to the prison warder by Fernando Briga? My dear Captain Alingdon--on what authority do you expect me to believe such a tale?" Her incredulity had in it an evident implication of bad faith, and I was stung to a quick reply. "If you will turn over the letter you will see." She continued to gaze at me a moment: then she obeyed. I don't think I ever admired her more than I did then. As she read the name a tremor crossed her face; and that was all. Her mind must have reached out instantly to the farthest consequences of the discovery, but the long habit of self-command enabled her to steady her muscles at once. If I had not been on the alert I should have seen no hint of emotion. For a while she looked fixedly at the back of the letter; then she raised her eyes to mine. "Can you tell me who wrote this?" she asked. Her composure irritated me. She had rallied all her forces to Briga's defence, and I felt as though my triumph were slipping from me. "Probably one of the clerks of the archives," I answered. "It is written in the same hand as all the other memoranda relating to the political prisoners of that year." "But it is a lie!" she exclaimed. "He was never admitted to the prisons." "Are you sure?" "How should he have been?" "He might have gone as his father's assistant." "But if he had seen my poor brother he would have told me long ago." "Not if he had really given up this letter," I retorted.