Determined to take all three steps the
first thing next day, West rested back comfortably in the chair,
already half asleep. One hand rested in his pocket, and as his fingers
fumbled some object there, he suddenly recalled the knife Sexton had
found in the alley.
He drew the article forth curiously, and looked at it under the glow of
the electric light--it was a small silver handled pen-knife, such as a
lady might carry, a rather strange thing to be discovered in a dirt alley
back of Wray Street. The incongruity struck him forcibly, and he sat up,
wide awake once more, seeking for some mark of identification on the
polished handle. There was none, not an inscription of any kind, but he
noted that the single slender blade did not fit closely down into its
place. He opened it idly to learn the cause--beneath appeared the white
gleam of tightly folded paper.
CHAPTER XX
WHAT THE TELEPHONE TOLD
All West's indifference vanished instantly. He had to pry the paper out,
so closely had it been wedged in beneath the closed knife blade, and it
required a moment in which to straighten it out so that the writing was
discernable. Even then the marks were so faint, and minute, he could not
really decipher them until he made use of a magnifying glass lying on the
desk. A woman's hand, using a pencil, had hastily inscribed the words on
a scrap of common paper, apparently torn from some book--the inspiration
of an instant, perhaps, a sudden hope born of desperation.
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