“Yes—yes, the letter.” She choked back a sob. “I—I read it. I read it, and I thought I should go mad! He said he was going—going to sh-shoot Hoode—that night!” “Your brother? What had he to do with Hoode?” Anthony was at once relieved and bewildered. He knew why she had said, ‘Who shot him?’ But why should Brother want to shoot? She seemed not to have heard his question. “I tried hard—ever so hard—to persuade myself that the letter was all nonsense, that it was a practical joke, or that Jimmy was ill or—or anything. But I couldn’t. He—he was so precise. The train he was coming by—and everything. The——” “What had your brother to do with Hoode?” Anthony interrupted. He felt that unless she were kept severely to the point her self-control would vanish altogether. “He was his secretary until Archie took his place—about six months ago. I—I never knew why Jimmy left, he wouldn’t tell me. He wouldn’t tell me, I say!” Anthony shifted uneasily in his chair. There had been a note of hysteria in those last words. Suddenly she was on her feet. “He did it! He did it!” she wailed, her hands flung above her head. “Oh, Christ! he’ll be—oh, Jimmy, Jimmy!” And then she began to laugh. Anthony jumped at her, took her by the shoulders, and shook. The ivory-white flesh seemed at once to chill and burn his clutching fingers. With every movement of his arms her head lolled helplessly. Knowing himself right, he yet detested himself. The dreadful laughter changed to sobbing; the sobbing to silence. “I’m s-sorry, p-please,” she said. Anthony’s hands fell to his sides. “I,” he said, “am a brute. Please sit down again.” They sat. A silence fell. At last he broke it. “Then you were so impressed by the sincerity of your brother’s letter that you determined you must try to stop him. Is that right?” She nodded. “But why, in God’s name, didn’t you walk or run, or do anything rather than swim?” “There wasn’t time. You see, it—it was so late—as I explained—before I read the—the l-letter that I knew th-that Jimmy was probably almost there. There wasn’t time to—to—to——” “I see. Judging that you’d save at least ten minutes by crossing the river here, you pretended you were going to bed, probably removed the more clinging of your garments—if you didn’t put on a bathing-dress—put on a pair of bathing-sandals to make running easy without hindering swimming, slipped out of the house quietly and beat all previous records to Abbotshall by at least ten minutes. That right?” “Yes.” Besides other emotions there was wonder in her tones. “Good. Now, when you were kneeling outside the window of Hoode’s study, what did you see? You’ll understand that if I am to be allowed to help you I must find out all I can and as quickly as I can.” Their lids veiled the great eyes. A convulsive movement of the white throat told of the strain she was under. When she spoke it was without feeling, without emphasis, like a dull child repeating a lesson memorised but not understood.