The detective hid his surprise.  He could not understand this confidence.  But then he knew nothing of the memories which lay back of it.  Not to him could this grievously humiliated and disappointed man reveal the secrets of a courtship which had fixed his heart on this one woman, and aroused in him such trust that even this uncalled-for outrage to his pride and affection had not been able to shake it.  Such secrets are sacred; but the reflection of his trust was strong on his face as he repeated: 

“Perfect confidence, Mr. Gerridge.  Whatever may have drawn Mrs. Ransom from my side, it was not lack of affection, or any doubt of my sincerity or undivided attachment to herself.”

The detective may not have been entirely convinced on the first point, but he was discretion itself, and responded quite cheerfully with an emphatic: 

“Very well.  You still want me to find her.  I will do my best, sir; but first, cannot you help me with a suggestion or two?”

“I?”

“There must be some clew to so sudden a freak on the part of a young and beautiful woman, who, I have taken pains to learn, has not only a clean record but a reputation for good sense.  The Fultons cannot supply it.  She has lived a seemingly open and happy life in their house, and the mystery is as great to them as to you.  But you, as her lover and now her husband, must have been favored with confidences not given to others.  Cannot you recall one likely to put us on the right track?  Some fact prior to the events of to-day, I mean; some fact connected with her past life; before she went to live with the Fultons?”

“No.  Yet let me think; let me think.”  Mr. Ransom dropped his face into his hands and sat for a moment silent.  When he looked up again, the detective perceived that the affair was hopeless so far as he was concerned.  “No,” he repeated, this time with unmistakable emphasis, “she has always appeared buoyant and untrammeled.  But then I have only known her six months.”

“Tell me her history so far as you know it.  What do you know of her life previous to your meeting her?”

“It was a very simple one.  She had a country bringing up, having been born in a small village in Connecticut.  She was one of three children and the only one who has survived; her sister, who was her twin, died when she was a small child, and a brother some five years ago.  Her fortune was willed her, as I have already told you, by a great-uncle.  It is entirely in her own hands.  Left an orphan early, she lived first with her brother; then when he died, with one relative after another, till lastly she settled down with the Fultons.  I know of no secret in her life, no entanglement, not even of any prior engagements.  Yet that man with the twisted jaw was not unknown to her, and if he is a relative, as she said, you should have no difficulty in locating him.”

“I have a man on his track,” Gerridge replied.  “And one on the girl’s too; I mean, of course, Bela Burton’s.  They will report here up to twelve o’clock to-night.  It is now half-past eleven.  We should hear from one or the other soon.”