"What
do you say?... Who killed Nita Selim?"
The parrot stirred on his perch, thrust out his hooked beak to nip his
master's prodding finger, then disdainfully turned his back.
"I don't blame you, Cap'n," Dundee chuckled. "You must be as sick of
that question as I am.... And what a pity it ever had to be asked! If
the murderer had not been so hasty--or so pressed for time that he
really could not wait to listen to Nita--he would have learned from
Nita herself that she had decided to be a very good girl, and had burned
the 'papers'--all because she was genuinely in love with Ralph
Hammond.... One comfort we have, 'my dear Watson': the murderer still
does not know that Nita burned the papers Friday night. Sooner or later,
when he believes police vigilance has been relaxed, he'll go prowling
about that house, and to Captain Strawn, who doesn't take the slightest
stock in my theory, will go credit for the arrest.... Unless--"
Dundee reached for a telegraph form and again scanned the pencilled
message. Only that afternoon had it occurred to him to ask the telegraph
company for a copy of the wire by which Dexter Sprague, according to his
own story, had been summoned to Hamilton by Nita Selim.
The manager had been obliging, had looked up the message and copied it
with his own hand.
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