"I hope that we'll learn the truth within the next three weeks," said Allen. "Everything turns on this boy Butsey. He knows the truth." "But will he tell it?" "I think he will. The lad is clever but venomous. The way in which he has been treated by his father and Don has made him bitter against them. Also, after the false alarm he gave the other night to get Parkins and me out of the mess, he can't very well go back to that place. The old man would murder him; and I don't fancy the poor little wretch would receive much sympathy from his father." "What do you think of him, Allen?" "My dear, I don't know enough about him to speak freely. From what the philanthropist in Whitechapel says, I think the boy is very clever, and that his talents might be made use of. He is abominably treated by the brutes he lives with--why, his eye was put out by his father. But the boy has turned on the gang. He burnt his boats when he raised that alarm, and I am quite sure in his own time, he will come down here and turn King's evidence." "About what?" "About the murder. The boy knows the truth. It's my opinion that Red Jerry killed your father, Eva." "How do you make that out?" she asked anxiously. "Well, Red Jerry knew of your father in Africa and knew that he was buying diamonds." Allen suppressed the fact of Strode's being an I. D. B. "He followed him home in the _Dunoon Castle_, and then went to tell Foxy and Father Don at Whitechapel. They came down to Westhaven and tracked your father to the Red Deeps, and there shot him. I can't understand why they did not take the wooden hand then, though." "Who did take the hand?" asked Eva. "My father. Yes," said Allen sadly, "you may look astonished and horrified, Eva, but it was my unhappy father. He is not in his right mind, Eva, for that is the only way to account for his strange behaviour;" and then Allen rapidly told Eva details. "Oh," said the girl when he finished, "he must be mad, Allen. I don't see why he should act in that way if he was not. Your father has always been an excitable, eccentric man, and this trouble of my father's death has been too much for him. I quite believe he intended to kill my father, and thank God he did not--that would have parted us for ever. But the excitement has driven your father mad, so he is not so much to blame as you think." "I am glad to hear you say so, darling," said the poor young fellow, "for it's been like a nightmare, to think that my father should behave in such a manner. I dreaded telling you, but I thought it was best to do so." "I am very glad you did," she replied, putting her arms round him; "oh, don't worry, Allen. Leave my father's murder alone. Go out to Bolivia, buy this mine, and when you have made your fortune come back for me. I'll be waiting for you here, faithful and true." "But you want to know who killed Mr. Strode?"