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"I had a messenger who used to bring it back and forth in a big lady's hat-box. It always was addressed to you, my dear, but the boy had instructions to deliver it to me."
"Humph," snapped Jane with mock indignation. "And when did you first find out that I was helping Chief Fleck watch you?"
"I suspected it from the start. Kramer told me how you'd become acquainted with him. Then when I heard you 'phoning Carter about the bookstore I knew for certain."
"Oh, that's one thing now I wanted to ask about--those messages Hoff left in the bookstore. Who were they for?"
"Instructions to a German advertising agency on how to word some advertisements that contained a code."
"Oh, those Dento advertisements?"
"You knew about them?" cried Seymour in astonishment.
"Of course," said Jane proudly. "I was the one who deciphered them; but what did that girl do with those messages? Carter had a theory that she slipped them under a dachshund's collar."
"That theory's just like Carter," laughed Frederic--"regular detective stuff. I never heard of any dachshund's being used. The girl used to slip them into a letter box in her apartment-house hallway. Two minutes later a man would get them and carry them to their destination."
"The traitors in our navy--the men who signalled old Otto and Lena Kraus about the transports--who were they? They are the scoundrels I'd like to see arrested and shot."
"Never worry. They'll all meet their deserts. I can't tell even you who they are, but I've given your Chief Fleck a list of them. They will be quickly rounded up now. What else can I tell you?"
"There's this," said Jane, the color rising to her cheeks as she drew forth from its hiding place in the bosom of her gown the packet he had entrusted to her the morning before, its seals still intact.
"What?" he cried in delight. "You kept it safe? You did not open it even when you saw me arrested, when you must have been convinced that I was a spy? Girl, dear girl"--his voice became a caress, and the light of love flamed up in his eyes, "you did trust me then, in spite of everything."
"I had promised you, and I kept my promise," faltered Jane, striving for words to explain, though she had been unable to explain her actions even to herself. "I think my heart trusted you all the time, even though my head and eyes made me believe you were what you pretended to be. Even when things looked blackest my heart persisted that you were true."