The Dermott news., 1917-08-16

the others noticed it. but 1t is my busls ness to take in even ineonsiderable de- tails. The pen was still between his fingers. His hand was constricted and the pen had not dropped out--in fact. I myself took it out and laid 1t on the desk"
 His last conscious acs was to write something, therefore?"
 "Yes; for confirmation I ascertained that there were ink-stains on his nn- gers"
 What did he write and to whomT
 "I don't know. I can only guess.'
 What do you guess?"
 "The assumption of entire responsi- bility and the exculpation of his son. probably to some paper"
 From the same motives that prompted Bert?
 "No, because 1t was true. But that is only an assumption, although not al- together without further evidence"
 And what Is that?" asked the wom- an eagerly.
 She had sat down opposite Rodney at the table and was leaning toward him. Her color came and went, her breathing was rapid and strained un- der the wild beating of her heart.
 "The blotter on the desk. l exam ined 1t at my leisure. It had been used some time. went over 1t with magnifying glass. Meade, Sr., had evil dently written letter. I found the words fault is mine I have the blot ter in my desk. The word fault Is barely deciphernble, fs' can be made out with difficulty, but mine is quite plain. I am familiar with the older Meade's handwriting. and though this is weaker and feebler and more 1rregu- lar than was his custom-ordlnarily he wrote a bold, free hand-this is un- mistakably his. Of course no one can say that he wrote any letter. This is l pil.ng assumption upon assumption. and, furthermore. there is no evidence of any signature having been written 1 beneath it."
 "ls that all?"
 "There Is one more bit of evidence. l The sheet of paper on which the de- sign computations for the compression chord members appear was not with 1 the other plans and tracings of the l bridge
 How do you know?"
 "These plans were taken over py l the Martlet company after Meade's 1 death, and Mir. Curtiss and I examined 1 them. We found that sheet missing"
 "lt's wonderful !" cried the girl. her eyes shining "I was convinced be- fore. but. if l had not been, you would have persuaded me beyond doubt
 .I have persuaded myself, too" said Rodney. But there is not single thing here that would justify any pub- licity. even if we were prepared to go against Meade's obvious desire. As say, it is all assumption. No one could prove It."
 You are wrong," said the girl. .Shurtliff"
 "I wondered If that would occur to you
 "Of course. You think that Meade. ST, wrote letter assuming the blame 1 because 1t was his. l have no doubt l in the world now that Bertram Meade had made his protest in writing. Per. haps he indorsed 1t on the missing 1 sheet" continued the woman, making bold md brilliant guesses. "Or maybe he wrote letter that was attached to the sheet that we lack, ~-.d MT. Meade got 1t out of the safe and wrote his letter and attached tt with Bertram's protest to the missing draw ing and gave them to Shurtliff and told him to take them to the papers. You know Sburtliff said that Meade de- clared he would assume the blame and he told the reporters so. Shurtliff has. or he knows who has. the missing pa- per"
 But what motive would the secre- tary have for such concealment?
 "He idoliZed the older Meade. MT. l Curtiss told me about him. failure