"What is it, Letty? Do you know—"
"Oh, Uncle Adam, do not ask me," she gasped. "I—I—there is some mistake—Tom did not—" she failed to go on and looked at the detective hopelessly.
"What do you know about these counterfeits? Come, it is best that you tell me everything," he continued kindly, but firmly.
"To—Tom had a counterfeit one hundred dollar bill. He—we went to the theatre and he got into some trouble over it, until he convinced the ticket seller that he did not know it was bad."
"Did he tell you where he got the bill?"
"No, he said he got stuck, that's all."
"Do you know what he did with it?"
"He said he was going to give it back and get a good one for it, if he could."
At that moment a postman's whistle sounded in the hallway and several letters dropped through the slit in the door. The girl glanced at them, and uttering a faint cry, arose and picked them up.
"Here is one from Tom now." She tore it open and glanced at it hastily. "I knew it," she went on. "He is all upset because of the murder and scarcely knows what to do. He had an important engagement in Albany for yesterday and one in New York for to-day, but has broken both. He says he will come to me as soon as he can, and adds a postscript asking me to look in the papers for the particulars of the awful affair. You read it, Uncle Adam. That doesn't look much as if he were guilty, does it?"