Page:William Le Queux - The Temptress.djvu/73

58 like look, enhancing the beauty of the picture. The lips were parted, disclosing even rows of small white teeth; the counterfeit presentment seemed to smile mockingly at him.

"Valérie's photograph!" he ejaculated, running his fingers through his hair, and gazing around in blank bewilderment. "How could it have come into Douglas's possession? Strange that I should find it here, unless—unless she, too, loved him."

"No," he added savagely, a moment afterwards. "Why should I think that? I'll not believe it until I have proof. And then, after all, they may not have been acquainted; the photograph may have come into his possession in some roundabout way. By the way," he continued, as a sudden thought occurred to him, "I might possibly discover something further."

Again he returned to the bureau, still holding the photograph in his hand, and after a few moments' eager search drew forth a small packet of letters tied with pink tape and sealed with red wax.

They had evidently been carefully preserved, for he discovered the packet concealed at the back of one of the small drawers in the interior.

With hands trembling with feverish excitement he took them to the window. Hastily he broke the seals, drew off the tape, and found there were three letters.

He felt a sudden throb at his heart, a touch of suspense that was painful, as he opened the first anxiously.

"Her handwriting!" he ejaculated excitedly, at the same time taking from his pocket a letter he had received that morning from Valerie, and placing them side by side.

The peculiarities of the fine angular caligraphycalligraphy [sic] were exactly similar.