Jerry replied:

'I came to tell you that Mr. Arthur has written the letter.'

'What letter?' Frank asked, for the moment forgetting the conversation
he had held with the child in the Tramp House.

'The one I promised to bring you to show you--the one to Germany,' was
Jerry's answer.

And then Frank remembered at once what, in the excitement of the diamond
theft, had passed from his mind.

'Yes, yes, I know; give it to me,' he said, advancing rapidly toward
her, and putting out his hand. 'When did he write it? Give it to me,
please.'

'But not to keep,' Jerry said, struck by something in his face and
manner which, it seemed to her, meant danger to the letter.

'Let me see it,' he continued.

And rather reluctantly Jerry handed him a bulky letter, the direction of
which covered nearly the whole of one side of the envelope.

Very nervously Frank scanned the address, which might as well have been
in the Fiji language for any idea it conveyed to him.

'To whom is it directed? I cannot read German,' he said

'I don't know,' Jerry replied. 'I have not looked at it, and would
rather not.'

'Why, what a little prude you are;' and Frank laughed uneasily. 'What
possible harm is there in reading an address? The postmaster has to do
it, and any one who took it to the office would do it if he could.'

This sounded reasonable enough, and standing beside him, while he held
the letter a little way from her, Jerry read the address in German
first, then, as he said to her: 'I don't understand that lingo, put it
into English,' she read again:

'To Marguerite Heinrich, if living, and if dead to any of her friends;
or to the postmaster at Wiesbaden, Germany. If not delivered within two
months, return to Arthur Tracy, Tracy Park, Shannondale, Mass., U.S.A.'

'Marguerite--Marguerite Heinrich!' Frank repeated, 'That is not
Gretchen. The letter is not to her.'

'I guess it is,' Jerry replied. 'He told me once that Gretchen was a pet
name for Marguerite.'

'Yes,' Frank returned, with a sigh, as this little crumb of hope was
swept away, while to himself he added: 'At all events it is not
Marguerite Tracy, and that makes me less a scoundrel than I should
otherwise be. If he had written a little more it would have run over to
the other side of the envelope. Any one would know he was crazy,' he
continued, with a sickly attempt at a smile, while Jerry stood waiting
to take the letter from him.

He knew she was waiting, and said