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A’‘previos with a wide written, in |, from Melinda Maclean.” | pencil, said: My dearest Donald, | that band of bb 4 y dearest’ —_ ly used white envelope was sealed jue paper on which was ; encil, “To Donald Duart Maclean The letter, also in ou ever receive this letter it will mean shan’t be here to tell you how much 1 love you and how really proud of you lam. My only regret is that perhaps you don’t know how 1 feel about you. I feel I leave behind and have id a wonder. , ful gift in your love and the exfistence of Fergie and Donaid. 1 am so looking forward to the new {| On the other hand, {f sh soe aus ny knowledge or even susp! er name on a London bank baby. It seems strangely like the first time and I think I shall really enjoy this baby completely, I never forget, | darling. that you love me and am living for the moment when | we shall ail be together again. my deepest love and | wishes for a happy life for you and the children.—MELINDA. This letter was written! before Melinda drifted slow!y | away into the anzsthetised | leep from which she might} vell’ never emerge. for the irth of her third baby, which, edically, she should not have had; was dangerous in the extreme. Might expect {t was-‘theletter of a courageous and generous girl, of a girl, moreover, who, cion of what he was doing, where he had gone. one would certalnjy have expected her to reveal it in a letter which was intended for Donald only if she ied. Why she did not afterwards destroy this letter, why she kept it with her for 27 months and then left it behind, is an- other mystery. Money ‘The baby, a healthy girl, was bern during the morning, and although Melinda was ex- tremely ill, she recovered fairly quickly and 14 days later she Jef! hospital to face, again, the tragic difficulties of being the . Wife of the Missing Diplomat. By the time she returned to . Beaconshaw most of the Press despite everything. still lo?tttnrd realised that Melinda and the man whose child she was about to bear. And, whatever happened afterwards, what- ever she may have felt and said from time to time, this jetter helps te explain ber actions two years later. But this touching letter had curious omissions, It made no reference of any kind to Mac- jean’'s disappearance. Melinda was still taking the attitude hat she refused to believe that was “traltor” and had gone behind the Iron Curtain, and that is clearly what she be'leved. But what did she think had happened to him? One might Nave expected in this possibly fareweil letigr there would be reference the fact that he had left heg some such sen- her family knew nothing more about Maclean's disappearance vhan they read in the news- papers. She had, moreover, been requested by the Foreign Office to ray nothing. In the Weeks between the birth of her baby daughter and the time she and her fami! left England for a holiday in the South of France, Melinda was near to breaking point, It was towards the end of ‘wy that’ Mrs, Dunbar, who had originally planned to take the two boys to France for a> seaside holiday while Melinda had her baby, decided that it was imperative to get Melinda Another | daughter, Mrs, Catherine Terrell, went to France and, after consulting * away. tence as “wherever you arc y3te agents, rented a la whatever you are doing.” some expression of her forgiveness for the grievous wrongs he had done her, . Melinda—left —-! York | address, far from St. Trepez, Belore they could go, two important developments occurred. On Friday, August 3, five weeks after Melinda and her new baby daughter—aiso called hospital, Mrs. - Dunbar received two regis- ' tered letters from St. Gall, near Zurich, in Switzerland, One was from the Swiss Bank Corporation and the other from nion Bank. of Switzerland, each contained a draft in i for £1,600. ‘The printed forms accom-! panying the chegues were almost ‘identical. “They stated | i merely! that the remittance 4 ‘was made “by order of Mr. Robert Becker, Hotel Central, | Zurich.” Mrs | no Robert Becker and was ex- pecting no money from witzerland. 1 But it as obvious, anyway, | that the money had come, in 1some way, from Donald Maclean and had been sent to, her rather than to Melinda In! case the name Maclean, still very much in the news, attracted attention. Mr. Becker Mrs. Dunbai immediately rang up M.L5 and experts hurried down to Tatsfield to examine the letters and take them aw’y for closer inspec- tion. Detectives flew to St. Gall where, with the help of the Federal Police, they attempted to trace Mr. Becker. They were unsuccessful, There is nothing in the world “closer” about its affairs and the affairs of its clients than a Swiss bank, and apart from a vague description of the man who had. boyght 1 two £1,000 cheques and the information that he had indi- cated that he was staying at the Hotel Centraf Zurich, and had given an address in’ New York, there was nothing else to be discovered. And even this was little u: No one of that name, it was found, had stayed at the Hotel utral, and as iP, the New it { | existent. streets are numbered, Ameri- ‘can detectives were able to | State that Mr. Becker's residence, liad it ex: een would ee ‘ate’ ape ye used, but it did not rj-¢ teresbeen approximately “M(-“quite true. was not quitc/f Dunbar knew }! was non-|" But, as New York]. ‘two di later,' received” a Sasso, from Maclean. It was undaicd' and bore no indication where, i. had i 2en written, but it had been posted the previous ‘day,! August 4, in England—at the! main post office at Guildford i in Surrey, only about 25 miles from Tatsfield. 3 Must know It was in the circumstances B® most Extraordinary letter— affectionate, loving, the kind of letter 4 husband . sudden: called away on business migh ha > written to his wife to e: plain that he was frightfuily sorry he had gone off so hurriedl,; but would soon be back, | It made no reterence to, where he.was or what he was} } doing. But it-said that she must know in her heart that he had to do what he had done; : (which meant entirely nothing! tofMeiinda), but that he coulf; i s]ill not tell her why he weg‘ of where he had gone. Ile sfid > “Y don't know what you must have thought of me going off and leaving you with no money.” MLLS He stated that he had sent £2,008 to her mother for her and the children: “I thought it would be better that way.” He hoped she and’ the child- ren were well and asked tenderly afier the new baby, which he knew had been born and was a girl It contained a fatuous phrase about “1 ean imagine you wi a daughter,” which was not the least like Maclean, who: ordinary letters were amusir and ‘far more sophisticated than that And -it asked whether the baby was fair like the other children or dark like . Melinda, .. And it ended wits his love. ° . The letter was most carefi examined by officials of MLL. 5, who cane rushing down to Tatsfield when Melinda tele- * phoned to tell them she had received it.” The writing was undoubtedly his, but it was a little shaky, a Jittle uncertain. The phraseology, if a little stilted, was on the whole that which be might conceivab' natural style. Melinda felt that it a