but we'll have a look at the box before
you go. It might be worth a bit more if it had a secret drawer, eh?"

When the shop was closed we went upstairs and laid the box on my bed,
and turned it over and tapped it, and put a lamp inside, and examined
every inch. We couldn't find a trace of a secret drawer, or anything
scratched on it to say where the old captain had hidden his long
stocking. So I concluded that the talk was the usual nonsense, and I
daresay I'd have sold it and thought no more about it, if the
goat's-beard man hadn't come in the first thing the next morning. He
didn't beat about the bush, but said he wanted Captain Markby's ditty-box
that we'd bought, and he'd give two pounds ten for it. I told him I
wished I'd got it to sell, since he was so generous, but ditty-boxes
weren't in my line.

The others that Isaac had spoken of came in too. I was tempted to sell
it to the mate for three pounds, but I couldn't quite make up my mind,
and told him to come again the next morning. That very night the two
Swedes broke into the shop. The police caught them. They're always on
the look-out round my place, knowing that it's a fiver to them on the
quiet if they catch anyone breaking in. The Swedes got three months
apiece.

That made up my mind. I showed the mate an ordinary box when he called,
and he went off grumbling that it was nothing like the one he'd asked
about, and I'd played the fool with him. I never saw him again, or the
Swedes either; but the old man and the ginger-headed chap were always
looking in the window. They seemed to have chummed up. I had an
anonymous letter that I put down to them--written in red ink that I
suppose they meant me to take for blood. It warned me against keeping "a
ditty-box that others have a better claim to, and is like to cost you
dear." D-e-r-e they spelt it, and one t in ditty.

Two days later they called to ask if the box had come my way yet. "Yes,"
I said, "and I'm going to keep it. It's got two blackguards three
months, and it will get two others a good hiding if they don't mind.
Clear out, and don't come here again." They didn't, but we often saw
them hanging round, and when I went out one of them generally followed
me. I didn't worry about that, for I could have settled the two of them
easily if I wasn't taken unaware. I was always a bit obstinate, and I'd
sooner have chopped the chest up for firewood than have been bullied
into letting them have it; but I was sorry th