"Really? You think the writer of both is the same?"
"Yes. Of course until I have studied the two letters in my possession a little more closely I can't be positively certain on the point; but I intend to submit them both to an expert at the first opportunity."
"I can help you there," said Carey quite eagerly. "I mean, if you do not know of a reliable expert I can give you the name of the cleverest man in England."
"Can you?" Anstice's notebook was out in a second. "Thanks very much—I will write to him to-morrow. But in my own mind I have not a shadow of doubt that the same person wrote them both."
"By the way"—Carey spoke slowly—"how many people about here would be likely to know the story you have told me to-night? Out in India, of course, there might be some who would remember such a tragic episode. But it's a far cry from Alostan to Littlefield."
"The only people in the neighbourhood who have heard the true story are, so far as I know, Sir Richard Wayne and"—he hesitated—"and his daughter, who is now Mrs. Cheniston."
"I see." Fraser Carey's eyes had noted the change of tone as Anstice spoke the last name; and his quick humanism was stirred by the pitiful idea which crossed his mind. "Sir Richard's daughter knew the story? And—may we conclude that her husband would naturally share her knowledge?"
"Naturally—yes." He emphasized the word. "You see I omitted to tell you that the girl I—the girl who was with me in the hut was engaged to this very man, Bruce Cheniston, whom Miss Wayne eventually married."
"Was she, indeed?" Carey was really surprised. "What a strange coincidence that you should meet again—as I suppose you met—in Littlefield."
"We met, yes," said Anstice, his eyes growing fierce at the remembrance of their meeting. "But—well, as you will readily see, none of those persons is in the least likely to have anything to do with the letters we are discussing. I daresay Mrs. Carstairs may possibly know the story—if her brother saw fit to hand it on to her. But so far as I know they are the only people who do know it, and naturally we can write all of them off the list of suspects at once."