I have written it out.”
“You have written it out?” said Hope quickly, and drawing near.
“Yes.
Jane thought that I was writing letters, but I was writing out the whole story of the murder. You were good to me, Random, you dear boy, and on the impulse of the moment I took the emerald to you.
I was sorry when I got back, but it was too late then to repent, as I did not dare to go near the Fort again.
Your spy who watched might have discovered me the second time.
I then thought that I would write out the story of the murder, so as to exonerate myself.”
“Then you are not guilty of Bolton’s death?” asked Sir Frank, puzzled, for her confession was somewhat incoherent.
“No.
I did not strangle him. But I know who did.
I have written it all down.
I was just finishing when I heard the tapping at the window.
I let him in and he tried to get the confession, for I told him what I had done.”
“Who did you tell?” asked Hope, much excited.
Mrs. Jasher took no notice.
“The confession is lying on my desk—all the sheets of paper are loose.
I had no time to bind them together, for he came in. He wanted the emerald, and the confession.
I told him that I had given the emerald to you, Random, and that I had confessed all in writing.
Then he went mad and flew at me with a dreadful knife.
He knocked over the candles and the lamp.
Everything went out and all was darkness, and I lay crying for help, with that devil stabbing—stabbing—ah—”
“Who, in heaven’s name, is the man?” demanded Random, standing up in his eagerness.
But Mrs. Jasher had fallen back in a faint, and Robinson was again supplying her with brandy.
“You had better leave the room, you two,” he said, “or I can’t be answerable for her life.”
“I must stay and learn the truth,” said Random determinedly, “and you, Hope, go into the parlor and find that confession.
It is on the desk, as she said, all loose sheets.
No doubt it was the confession which the man she refers to tried to secure when he came back the second time.
He may make another attempt, or Painter may go to sleep.
Hurry! hurry!”
Archie needed no second telling, as he realized what hung on the securing of the confession.
He stole swiftly out of the room, closing the door after him.
Faint as was the sound, Mrs. Jasher heard it and opened her eyes.
“Do not go, Random,” she said faintly. “I have yet much to say, although the confession will tell you all. I am half sorry I wrote it out—at least I was—and perhaps should have burnt it had I not met with this accident.”
“Accident!” echoed Sir Frank scornfully. “Murder you mean.”
The sinister word galvanized the dying woman in sudden strong life, and she reared herself again on the bed.
“Murder!
Yes, it is murder,” she cried loudly.
“He killed Sidney Bolton to get the emeralds, and he killed me to make me close my mouth.”
“Who stabbed you? Speak! speak!” cried Random anxiously.
“Cockatoo.
He is guilty of my death and Bolton’s,” and she fell back, dead.
CHAPTER XXV. THE MILLS OF GOD
In the cold gray hours of the morning, Hope and his friend left the cottage wherein such a tragedy had taken place.
The dead woman was lying stiff and white on her bed under a winding sheet, which had already been strewn with many-hued chrysanthemums taken from the pink parlor by the weeping Jane.
The wretched woman who had led so stormy and unhappy a life had at least one sincere mourner, for she had always been kind to the servant, who formed her entire domestic staff, and Jane would not hear a word said against the dead.
Not that anyone did say anything; for Random and Hope kept the contents of the confession to themselves. There would be time enough for Mrs. Jasher’s reputation to be smirched when those same contents were made public.
When the poor woman died, Random left the doctor and the servant to look after the corpse, and went into the parlor. Here he met Hope with the confession in his hand.
Luckily, Painter was not in the room at the moment, else he would have prevented the artist from taking away the same.
Hope—as directed by Mrs. Jasher—had found the confession, written on many sheets, lying on the desk.
It broke off abruptly towards the end, and was not signed.