“It will come to them as a ray of light in the dark—­my news,” he said.  “And now, thank you once again.”

We parted and I came back here to my lodgings.  The mystery is finally solved, though in such a way it is difficult to believe that it was anything but a nightmare at any time.  But solved none the less; and I should be at peace, except for one great black fact that haunts me, will not let me rest.  I must tell you, dear lady —­And yet I fear it means the end of everything.  If only I can make you understand!

I have walked my floor, deep in thought, in puzzlement, in indecision.  Now I have made up my mind.  There is no other way —­I must tell you the truth.

Despite the fact that Bray was Von der Herts; despite the fact that he killed himself at the discovery—­despite this and that, and everything—­Bray did not kill Captain Fraser-Freer!

On last Thursday evening, at a little after seven o’clock, I myself climbed the stairs, entered the captain’s rooms, picked up that knife from his desk, and stabbed him just above the heart!

What provocation I was under, what stern necessity moved me—­all this you must wait until to-morrow to know.  I shall spend another anxious day preparing my defense, hoping that through some miracle of mercy you may forgive me—­understand that there was nothing else I could do.

Do not judge, dear lady, until you know everything—­until all my evidence is in your lovely hands. 
                                        Yours, in all humility.

The first few paragraphs of this the sixth and next to the last letter from the Agony Column man had brought a smile of relief to the face of the girl who read.  She was decidedly glad to learn that her friend no longer languished back of those gray walls on Victoria Embankment.  With excitement that increased as she went along, she followed Colonel Hughes as—­in the letter—­he moved nearer and nearer his denouement, until finally his finger pointed to Inspector Bray sitting guilty in his chair.  This was an eminently satisfactory solution, and it served the inspector right for locking up her friend.  Then, with the suddenness of a bomb from a Zeppelin, came, at the end, her strawberry man’s confession of guilt.  He was the murderer, after all!  He admitted it!  She could scarcely believe her eyes.

Yet there it was, in ink as violet as those eyes, on the note paper that had become so familiar to her during the thrilling week just past.  She read it a second time, and yet a third.  Her amazement gave way to anger; her cheeks flamed.  Still—­he had asked her not to judge until all his evidence was in.  This was a reasonable request surely, and she could not in fairness refuse to grant it.

CHAPTER VIII

So began an anxious day, not only for the girl from Texas but for all London as well.  Her father was bursting with new diplomatic secrets recently extracted from his bootblack adviser.  Later, in Washington, he was destined to be a marked man because of his grasp of the situation abroad.  No one suspected the bootblack, the power behind the throne; but the gentleman from Texas was destined to think of that able diplomat many times, and to wish that he still had him at his feet to advise him.