"
"Not now; I'll wait until Mr. Westcott comes down. What is that paper
in your hand? Is that the letter Miss La Rue left?"
He held it up in surprise, gazing at it through his glasses.
"Why, Lord bless me--it is, isn't it? Must have took it out o' ther
drawer an' never thought of the darned thing agin."
"May I see it?"
"Sure; 'tain't o' no consequence ter me; I reckon the woman sorter
packed in a hurry, and this got lost. The Chink found it under the
bed."
She took it in her hand, and crossed the room, finding a seat beneath
one of the bracket-lamps, but with her face turned toward the hall. It
was just a single sheet of folded paper, not enclosed in an envelope,
and had been torn across, so that the two parts barely held together.
She stared at it for a moment, almost motionless, her fingers nervously
moving up and down the crease, as though she dreaded to learn what was
within. She felt that here was the key which was to unlock the secret
of this strange crime. Whoever the man upstairs might prove to be--the
real Cavendish or some impostor--this paper she held in her hands was
destined to be a link in the chain.
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