Without an instant’s hesitation he sat down and wrote an answer, in which he said:
‘You have no further claim on my friendship, nor on Miss Owen’s. Fortunately, she is now under my protection, and in a place where you are not likely to find her. Do not expect for one moment that I shall do anything to bring her again within the reach of your dangerous character. Only the memory of our old kindness restrains me from writing in a very much stronger way. I am sorry that I must ask you never to hold communication with me again.’
Meanwhile Prescott had been doing his utmost to obtain some further light upon the mystery. But neither his inquiries nor those of the skilled detective whom he sent down at his own expense to investigate had resulted so far in finding the smallest clue to what had happened on the night of the first of June.
He had not seen Eleanor since they parted at Abertaff. He now received a letter from her, in which she fulfilled her promise of letting him know her address. But her letter was so despondent, and showed her to feel her situation so deeply, that Prescott was greatly shocked and grieved.
Two days after he was roused by seeing in the papers this announcement:
‘The Porthstone Murder: Discovery of the Lost Jewels.—Last night, while dragging for fish along the shore of Newton Bay, some fishermen brought to land in their net a chest which had evidently been in the water some time. On being opened, it was found to be full of valuable gems. The police were at once communicated with, it being supposed that they were those missing since the night of the murder. They sent for Mr. Lewis, but as he was unable to speak to their identity, Mr. Williams, of Abertaff, who had supplied deceased with jewellery, was wired for, and he came down by the next train and identified the contents of the chest as the missing jewels. It will be remembered that a part of the body was discovered at or about the same place.
‘The importance of the discovery is in negativing the theory that the crime was committed for the sake of robbery. But it cannot be said that the mystery which has enshrouded this murder from first to last is in any degree dispelled by this new incident.’
While Prescott was still pondering over this discovery, and its bearing on the position of Eleanor and the facts in the case, he received a second letter from Tressamer.
His first impulse was to return it unopened, but he thought this might be doing an injustice, as the letter might contain some explanation, though hardly any excuse for his strange conduct. He therefore opened it.