"But the bicycle!" I cried. "The bicycle! You ought to have
mentioned that. You were the only one who saw it. It was a clue to
the murderer."

"If I'd told," Aunt Emma answered, "I should never have been allowed
to take charge of you at all. I thought my one clear duty was to my
sister's child: it was to take care of your health in your shattered
condition. And even now, Una, I tell you only for this: if you find
out anything new, in Canada or here, try not to drag me into it. I
couldn't stand the strain. Cross-examination would kill me."

"I'll remember it, auntie," I said, wearied out with excitement.
"But I think you did wrong, all the same. In a case like this, it's
everybody's first duty to tell all he knows, in the interests of
justice."

However, this confession of Aunt Emma's rendered one thing more
certain to me than ever before. I was sure I was on the right track
now, after Courtenay Ivor. The bicycle clinched the proof.

But I said nothing as yet to the police, or to my friendly
Inspector. I was determined to hunt the whole thing up on my own
account first, and then deliver my criminal, when fully secured, to
the laws of my country.

Not that I was vindictive. Not that I wanted to punish the man. No;
I shrank terribly from the task. But to relieve myself from this
persistent sense of surrounding mystery, and to free others from
suspicion, I felt compelled to discover him. It seemed to me like a