the table.

"Great Scott, parson, here it is striking five o'clock, and you've
been up all night!" he exclaimed, anxiously. "Here--no more gassing.
You come lie down on my bed and snooze a bit. I'll call you in plenty
of time for mass."

I was far too spent and tired to move across the garden to the Parish
House. I suffered myself to be put to bed like a child, and had my
reward by falling almost immediately into a dreamless sleep, nor did I
stir until he called me, a couple of hours later. He himself had not
slept, but had employed the time in going through the letters open on
his table. He pointed to them now, with a grim smile.

"Parson!" said he, and his eyes glittered. "Do you know what we've
stumbled upon? Dynamite! Man, anybody holding that bunch of mail could
blow this state wide open! So much for a hunch, you see!"

"You mean--"

"I mean I've got the cream off Inglesby's most private deals, that's
what I mean! I mean I could send him and plenty of his pals to the
pen. Everybody's been saying for years that there hasn't been a rotten
deal pulled off that he didn't boss and get away with it. But nobody
could prove it. He's had the men higher-up eating out of his
hand--sort of you pat my head and I'll pat yours arrangement--and
here's the proof, in black and white. Don't you understand? Here's the
proof: these get him with the goods!

"These," he slapped a letter, "would make any Grand Jury throw fits,
make every newspaper in the state break out into headlines like a kid
with measles, and blow the lid off things in general--if they got out.

"Inglesby's going to shove Eustis under, is he? Not by a jugfull. He's
going to play he's a patent life-preserver. He's going to _be_ that
good Samaritan he's been shamming. Talk about poetic justice--this
will be like wearing shoes three sizes too small for him, with a
bunion on every toe!" And when I looked at him doubtfully, he laughed.

"You can't see how it's going to be managed? Didn't you ever hear of
the grapevine telegraph? Well then, dear George receives a grapevine
wireless bright and early to-morrow morning. A word to the wise is
sufficient."

"He will employ detectives," said I, uneasily.

The Butterfly Man looked at me quizzically.

"_With_ an eagle eye and a walrus mustache," said he, grinning. "Sure.
But if the plainclothes nose around, are they going to sherlock the
parish priest and the town bughunter? _We_ haven't got any interest in
Mr. Ingle