How strange it seemed! The lovely room, with dainty white and gold furnishings, reminded me so forcibly of the bewitching girl who owned it all. A thousand questions rose in my mind. What would become of that bijou residence? The bric-a-brac and pictures, the rugs and furniture, while not magnificent, were of the best, and many of them costly. The great Chinese vase, into which I was to drop the letters was a gem of its kind, though not anything a connoisseur would covet. I raised the dragon-topped lid, and let the letters fall in. Replacing the lid, I still lingered. My errand was done, but I felt an impulse to stay. Everything spoke to me of Vicky Van. Where was she now? Making sure that the opaque blinds were drawn, I dared to turn on one tiny electric lamp. The faint light made the shadowed room lovelier than ever. Could a girl of such cultivated tastes and such refinement of character be a--a wrong-doer? I couldn't say murderer even to myself. Then my common sense flared up, and told me that crime is no respecter of persons. That women who had slain human beings were not necessarily of this or that walk of life. Granted a woman had a motive to kill a man, that motive lay in the impulses of her feminine nature, and revenge, jealousy, fear, love or hate--whatever the motive, it was of deep and over-powering and might find its root in equal likeliness in the breast of queen or beggarmaid. I could not say Vicky was incapable of crime--indeed, her gay, volatile manner might hide a deeply perturbed spirit. She was an enigma, and I--I must solve the riddle. I felt I should never rest, until I knew the truth, and if Vicky were a martyr to circumstances, or a victim to Fate, I must know all about it. Alone there, in the midnight hours, I resolved to devote my time, all I could spare, my energies, all I could command, and my life, so far as I might, to the discovery of the truth, and I might or might not reveal my findings as seemed to me best. Leaving the music room, I went back through the long hall, and passed the door of Vicky's bedroom. Reverently I looked inside. The very walls seemed crying for her to come back. Would she ever so do? I wandered on through the bedroom, and even looked in the dressing room. I felt no compunction. It was not from idle curiosity, rather, I walked as one at a shrine. The exquisitely feminine boudoir was a mute witness to a love of beauty and art. I used only my flashlight, but on an impulse, I turned on one light by the side of the long mirror. I looked in it, as Vicky must often have done when dressing for her parties, as, indeed, she must have done, when dressing that last fatal night and seeing my own grim reflection, I gravely nodded my head at myself, and whispered, "We'll find the truth, old man, you see if we don't!"