How could she even begin? There was so much she wanted to say, and yet how was she to plead that the man, sitting there at his desk, so courteous and ready to oblige, had wrongfully sent Robert Eldridge to death? Behind that undistinguished face lurked a keen brain, shrewd and calculating. He had put two and two together, like hundreds of men before him, and he had made it five.
"Superintendent." she began, "I beg of you not to be offended by anything I may say. I know that Robert Eldridge was innocent."
The face of Superintendent Ruddock was kind and non-committal.
"Please, madam," he said, "do not consider my personal feelings in the matter at all. I only did my duty, and I am sorry, dreadfully sorry, that it should have caused you so much pain and suffering. If there is anything that
