'Perhaps it is best so,' Captain Hampton agreed, though he felt the ring of pain in the girl's voice at what she believed to be a sign that he doubted her. 'I am willing, as I said just now, to disbelieve the evidence of my own eyes on your word. I am determined to believe you innocent. It is impossible for me to do otherwise. But there is one matter I want cleared up. On the fifteenth of last month—that is the day on which these things were missed—I saw a lady so exactly like you in face and in dress that I should under any other circumstances be prepared to swear to her, speaking to the man Truscott, in the Liverpool Road, Islington. This was at about half-past four in the afternoon.'
A look of blank wonderment passed across Dorothy's face as he spoke, and then changed into one of indignation.
'I was never in Islington in my life, Captain Hampton; I never heard the name of Liverpool Road that I know of. I have never seen this man, Truscott, since that day at Epsom. And you have believed this? You believe that I would meet this man alone, for the purpose, I suppose, of bribing him to silence? I have been mistaken in you altogether, Captain Hampton. I thought you were a friend.'
'Stop, Dorothy,' her father said, authoritatively, as with her head erect she walked towards the door, 'you must listen to this; it is altogether too important to be treated in this way. We must hear what Captain Hampton really saw, and he will tell us why he did not mention the fact to me before. Sit down, my dear. Now, Captain Hampton, please tell it to us again.'
Ned Hampton repeated his story, and then went on,
'You know I went suddenly out of town, Mr. Hawtrey. That I had been mistaken never once occurred to me. Up to that time I had never for an instant doubted your daughter's assertions that she knew nothing as to any letters in the possession of Truscott. That morning, as you may remember, I mentioned before you the name of the place where he was to be found, and when, as I thought, I saw her with him, it certainly appeared to me possible that after the dread Miss Hawtrey expressed of appearing in a public court to prosecute him, she might, in a moment of weakness, have gone off to see the man, to warn him of the consequences that would ensue if he continued to persecute her, and to tell him that unless he moved he would in a few hours be in custody. I thought such an action altogether foreign to her nature, but I own that it never for a moment occurred to me to doubt the evidence of my own eyes, especially as the person was dressed exactly as your daughter had been when I saw her that morning. That the person I saw was not her I am now quite ready to admit. In that case it is morally certain that the person who took away those jewels was also not her; and this strengthens the idea I had before conceived, and which seemed, as I told you, a most improbable one, namely, that there is another person who so closely resembles your daughter that she might be mistaken for her, and, if so, this person is acting with the man Truscott. Should this conjecture be the true one it explains what has hitherto been so mysterious. The letters were designed to injure your daughter in public estimation, and to prepare the way for this extraordinary robbery, which would enrich Truscott as well as gratify his revenge. What do you think, Mr. Hawtrey?'
'The idea is too new for me to grasp it altogether, Ned. Until now there seemed no possible explanation of the mystery. This, certainly, strange and improbable as it is, does afford a solution.'
'Well, father, I will leave you to talk it over,' Dorothy said, rising again, 'unless Captain Hampton has seen me anywhere else and wishes to question me about that also. And I think, father, that it will be much better in future to put the matter altogether into the hands of a lawyer; it would be his business to do his best for me whether he thought me innocent or guilty. At any rate, it is more pleasant to be suspected by people you know nothing about, than by those you thought were your friends.' Then without waiting for an answer she swept from the room.
'No use stopping her now,' her father said, shrugging his shoulders; 'it is not often that I have known Dorothy fairly out of temper from the time she was a child, but when she is it is better to let her cool down and come round of herself.'
'It will be a long time before she comes round as far as I am concerned,' Captain Hampton said. 'I am not surprised that she should be indignant that I should have suspected her for a moment, but I don't see how I could have helped it. I saw her, or someone as much like her as if it was herself in a looking-glass, talking to this man Truscott, the very day when we had for the first time found out where we were likely to lay hands on him. What could anyone suppose? I did not think for a moment that she had done anything really wrong, or even, after what she had said, that he could hold letters of any importance; but she had evidently so great a dread of publicity that, as I say, it did strike me she had gone to meet him in order to warn him, and perhaps to get back any trumpery letters he might have had, stolen from her or from some one else. I did think this up to the time when you told me of this affair at the jeweller's. That seemed so utterly and wholly impossible that I became convinced there must be some entirely different solution, if we could but hit upon it, and the only idea that occurred to me was that of there being some one else exactly like her, and that this person, whoever she is, has been used by Truscott both to injure your daughter and to obtain plunder.'