The fear that he was destined to do so grew upon him rapidly, and the temptation to open the letter and make himself master of its contents before leaving town at last became so strong that his sense of honour paled before it, and he made up his mind that before he ventured into the precincts of Sutherlandtown he would know just what sort of a bombshell he was carrying into the Sutherland family.  To do this he stopped at the first respectable lodging-house he encountered and hired a room.  Calling for hot water “piping hot,” he told them—­he subjected the letter to the effects of steam and presently had it open.  He was not disappointed in its contents, save that they were even more dangerous than he had anticipated.  Captain Wattles was an old crony of Frederick’s and knew his record better than anyone else in the world.  From this fact and the added one that Frederick had stood in special need of money at the time of Agatha Webb’s murder, the writer had no hesitation in believing him guilty of the crime which opened his way to a fortune, and though under ordinary circumstances he would, as his friend Frederick already knew, be perfectly willing to keep his opinions to himself, he was just now under the same necessity for money that Frederick had been at that fatal time, and must therefore see the colour of two thousand five hundred dollars before the day was out if Frederick desired to have his name kept out of the Boston papers.  That it had been kept out up to this time argued that the crime had been well enough hidden to make the alternative thus offered an important one.

There was no signature.

Sweetwater, affected to an extent he little expected, resealed the letter, made his excuses to the landlord, and left the house.  Now he could see why he had not been allowed to make his useless sacrifice.  Another man than himself suspected Frederick, and by a word could precipitate the doom he already saw hung too low above the devoted head of Mr. Sutherland’s son to be averted.

“Yet I’ll attempt that too,” burst impetuously from his lips.  “If I fail, I can but go back with a knowledge of this added danger.  If I succeed, why I must still go back.  From some persons and from some complications it is useless to attempt flight.”

Returning to the club-house he had first entered in his search for Captain Wattles, he asked if that gentleman had yet come in.  This time he was answered by an affirmative, though he might almost as well have not been, for the captain was playing cards in a private room and would not submit to any interruption.

“He will submit to mine,” retorted Sweetwater to the man who had told him this.  “Or wait; hand him back this letter and say that the messenger refuses to deliver it.”

This brought the captain out, as he had fully expected it would.

“Why, what—­” began that gentleman in a furious rage.

But Sweetwater, laying his hand on the arm he knew to be so sensitive, rose on tiptoe and managed to whisper in the angry man’s ear: