e was regarding him.
"Do you recognise it?" he asked abruptly.

He held out the cover to her, turning it over so that she could see both
sides.

"It is one of the Bank envelopes; I don't recognise anything else," she
replied.

Taking the letter from the cover, he spread it open and held it out.

"Now do you know it?"

"Charlie's writing!"

Her eyes, after one rapid glance at it, were raised to his.

"You recognise it?"

"I recognise the writing, yes. It is his. Do you wish me to read it?"

"If you have not already done so."

She took the letter from him. As she read the first sentence she raised
her eyes, filled with piteous anguish, to his.

"Oh, Fred!" she exclaimed. "Oh, what is this? Where did you get it?"

Without waiting for an answer she looked at it again. Her face went as
white as the paper, a violent fit of trembling seized her, and she sank
to her knees beside the table, burying her head on her arms.

"Oh, Fred! Fred! Why--why did you let me see it?" she moaned.

"Is it not yours?" he asked in a hoarse whisper.

"Mine?"

She was on her feet, facing him, with eyes that blazed through the tears
which filled them.

"You believed that? You believed I had this when--that I had read it
when we were at Taloona? You believed that?"

"It was given to me by one of the troopers, who picked it up where you
had been kneeling when you attended to Durham's wound. The man said it
was either yours or mine. I knew it was not mine, so I took it to give
it to you. I should have given it at once, but I forgot it at the
moment. When I read it----"

"Go on," she said in a hard voice as he paused.

"When I read it I----"

Her eyes disconcerted him; he could not bring himself to say to her face
he suspected her.

"When you read it--you believed it was mine," she said steadily.

"For the moment, yes; I had no alternative. Then--later--I was
uncertain."

"Uncertain of what?"

"Uncertain whether it was yours. At first I intended to hand it over to
Brennan, as Durham was too ill to understand. Of course, that would have
made it public, and you--well, you would have been suspected, at the
least, of complicity in the robbery. I could not believe that of
you--could not, even with this in my possession. I came back to Waroona
in the morning intending to see you and hear what explanation you had to
offer before taking any further steps. But you were not at the bank, and
when I got there I was done up."

The