"Where?" asked Edith, much interested.
"In the Yellow Room. It was sewn into the hangings, between the satin and the lining, and, but for the particular minute search I made, would never have been discovered. I dare say Ellen Gilmar hid it thus safely so that she might not be accused of the crime in her lifetime; but no doubt when dying she intended to indicate its hiding-place, so that I might be set free and my character cleared, after she was safe from the punishment of man."
"As she is," observed Ferris, bitterly.
"Leave her to God," said Dean, slowly. "As she has sown, so shall she reap, and I wish her no worse fate. Well," continued he, "you will understand that as soon as I discovered this proof of my innocence I was bent upon clearing myself. But this was not so easy to do. I had escaped from gaol, and were I discovered would be at once taken back, when, as I fancied, the confession might go astray or prove useless. It was towards the end of July last that I found it, and I consulted Mr. Alder, who came down about the same time to visit Edith."
"Yes," said Edith, colouring. "He came to ask me again to marry him."
"Alder advised me to place the confession in the hands of Basson, and offered to take it up to him. But at the moment I was unwilling to let this proof of my innocence leave my hands, and I determined to go up to London myself and see Basson. But, thinking I might be discovered, I feared to do so--or at all events to go to Basson's office. I wrote and told Alder this, so he suggested that I should go to Grangebury, where Mr. Basson was giving a lecture, on the twenty-fourth of July, and he said I could come up late and see Mr. Basson before the lecture, place the confession in his hands with instructions what to do, and then return by a late train to Norminster. Thus, he said in his letter, I should be exposed to less risk of discovery. The advice seemed good to me, and I adopted it."
"But where did you get the money to visit London?" asked Edith. "For I never gave you any."
"I borrowed it from Mrs. Grix, and told her I was visiting a friend," explained Dean. "Also I asked her to tell you that I had gone into Norminster, in case you missed me."
"I didn't miss you at all, and there was no need for Mrs. Grix to say anything," said Miss Wedderburn. "All the same," she added reproachfully, "you might have trusted me."
"And me also," interposed Ferris. "I should have had the confession, not Basson."