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Rh One of them bore in a temperamental, feminine hand only three letters of a word, but they were illuminating: "lov." Odell smiled as he replaced it in his pocket; but his expression changed when he glanced at the others. The writing upon them was all in a bold, dashing, masculine hand, and two of the scraps fitted together read: "whole family in hell before."

Odell frowned thoughtfully and drew from his left coat-pocket one of the letters which he had taken from the center drawer in the desk. It was in the same strongly accentuated writing, and read without preamble:

Barry Odell folded the letter slowly and replaced it in its envelope. To-day was the fourteenth, and Julian Chalmers had come to his death just eight days before—on the sixth!