lf. It was thrust carelessly, and even, as it seemed,
contemptuously, into one of the uppermost divisions of the rack.

"No sooner had I glanced at this letter than I concluded it to be
that of which I was in search. To be sure, it was, to all appearance,
radically different from the one of which the Prefect had read us so
minute a description. Here the seal was large and black, with the
D---- cipher; there it was small and red, with the ducal arms of the
S---- family. Here the address, to the Minister, was diminutive and
feminine; there the superscription, to a certain royal personage,
was markedly bold and decided; the size alone formed a point of
correspondence. But, then, the _radicalness_ of these differences,
which was excessive; the dirt; the soiled and torn condition of the
paper, so inconsistent with the _true_ methodical habits of D----, and
so consistent of a design to delude the beholder into an idea of
the worthlessness of the document--these things, together with the
hyperobtrusive situation of this document, full in the view of every
visitor, and thus exactly in accordance with the conclusions to
which I had previously arrived--these things, I say, were strongly
corroborative of suspicion in one who came with the intention to
suspect.

"I protracted my visit as long as possible, and, while I maintained a
most animated discussion with the Minister upon a topic which I knew
well had never failed to interest and excite him, I kept my attention
riveted upon the letter. In this examination I committed to memory its
external appearance and arrangement in the rack, and also fell, at
length, upon a discovery which set at rest whatever trivial doubt I
might have entertained. In scrutinizing the edges of the paper,
I observed them to be more _chafed_ than seemed necessary. They
presented the _broken_ appearance which is manifested when a stiff
paper, having been once folded and pressed with a folder, is refolded
in a reversed direction, in the same creases or edges which formed the
original fold. This discovery was sufficient. It was clear to me that
the letter had been turned, as a glove, inside out, re-directed and
re-sealed. I bade the Minister good-morning, and took my departure at
once, leaving a gold snuff-box upon the table.

"The next morning I called for the snuff-box, when we resumed, quite
eagerly, the conversation of the preceding day. While thus engaged,
however, a loud report, as if of a pistol, wa