"But the final letter?"

"It bears evidence of being written in the first moments of wild anger on realising that she had been abandoned in favour of Mary. Probably she has by this time quite forgotten the words she wrote. And in any case the fact of her living beneath the same roof, supervising the household, and attending to the sick man during Mary's absence, entirely negatives any idea of revenge."

Jevons smiled dubiously, and I myself knew that my argument was not altogether logical.

"Well?" I continued. "And is not that your opinion?"

"No. It is not," he replied, bluntly.

"Then what is to be done?" I asked, after a pause.

"The matter rests entirely with you, Ralph," he replied. "I know what I should do in a similar case."

"What would you do? Advise me," I urged eagerly.

"I should take the whole of the correspondence, just as it is, place it in the grate there, and burn it," he said.

I was not prepared for such a suggestion. A similar idea had occurred to me, but I feared to suggest to him such a mode of defeating the ends of justice.

"But if I do that will you give me a vow of secrecy?" I asked, quickly. "Recollect that such a step is a serious offence against the law."

"When I pass out of this room I shall have no further recollection of ever having seen any letters," he answered, again giving me his hand. "In this matter my desire is only to help you. If, as you believe, Ethelwynn is innocent, then no harm can be done in destroying the letters, whereas if she is actually the assassin she must, sooner or later, betray her guilt. A woman may be clever, but she can never successfully cover the crime of murder."

"Then you are willing that I, as finder of those letters, shall burn them? And further, that no word shall pass regarding this discovery?"

"Most willing," he replied. "Come," he added, commencing to gather them together. "Let us lose no time, or perhaps the constable on duty below or one of the plain-clothes men may come prying in here."

Then at his direction and with his assistance I willingly tore up each letter 

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