"I fancy I've got what you want," he said. "What is the number on your paper?"
"44791," Field said, "and the date."
"Never mind dates, that is quite immaterial, Mr. Field. You have us now. That stamped parchment was sold early this morning, just after the office was open—why, I must have sold it myself. Yes; there is no mistake."
With a grim smile on his face, Field drove back to London. He began to see his way clearer to the end of the mystery now.
CHAPTER XXIX
The cab with Mary Sartoris inside jolted along behind the other one, and presently Mary was greatly relieved to find that her horse was going the faster of the two. She bitterly blamed herself now for her folly in not waiting to see Beatrice, and still more so for trusting so important a letter in the hands of a mere servant.
But it was idle to repine over the thing now. The mischief had been done and the great thing was to repair it as soon as possible. As Mary's mind emerged from the haze in which it had been enveloped for the last few days, she began to see things more clearly. Now she realised that she had no settled plan of action when she set out to see Beatrice. She would have had to tell her everything or nothing had they met, and she could not have done this without making certain disclosures about her brother. She saw now that it would have been far better to have destroyed the letter and said nothing about it.
But then Mary could not tell a deliberate lie of that kind, and Carl Sartoris would have been pretty sure to have asked the question. He was pleased to regard his sister more or less in the light of a fool, but he did not trust her any the more for that.
Mary lay back in the cab and resigned herself to the inevitable. It was good to feel that she was leaving the others behind now, and her spirits rose accordingly.