ys he, whinever we want it, says
he. An' if it all goes right out there, says he, it won't be lahng
before we shall want to find it, says he. And I can dipind on you,
says he, for we're both in the same boat, says he, an' you knows what I
knows, says he, an' I knows what you knows, says be. And thin he taks a
stack o' paupers out of his pocket, an' he pulls out one of 'em, an' he
says to her, says he, that's the pauper, says he, an' if you die, says
be, niver lose sight of that day or night, says he, for it's life an'
dith to both of us, says he. An' thin he asks her if she has n't got one
o' them paupers--what is 't they cahls 'em?--divilops, or some sich kind
of a name--that they wraps up their letters in; an' she says no, she has
n't got none that's big enough to hold it. So he says, give me a shate
o' pauper, says he. An' thin he takes the pauper that she give him, an'
he folds it up like one o' them--divilops, if that's the name of 'em;
and thin he pulls a stick o' salin'-wax out of his pocket, an' a stamp,
an' he takes the pauper an' puts it into th' other pauper, along with
the rest of the paupers, an' thin he folds th' other pauper over the
paupers, and thin he lights a candle, an' he milts the salin'-wax, and
he sales up the pauper that was outside th' other paupers, an' he writes
on the back of the pauper, an' thin he hands it to Miss Badlam."

"Did you see the paper that he showed her before he fastened it up with
the others, Kitty?"

"I did see it, indade, Mr. Gridley, and it's the truth I'm tellin' ye."

"Did you happen to notice anything about it, Kitty?"

"I did, indade, Mr. Gridley. It was a longish kind of a pauper, and
there was some blotches of ink on the back of it,--an' they looked like
a face without any mouth, for, says I, there's two spots for the eyes,
says I, and there's a spot for the nose, says I, and there's niver a
spot for the mouth, says I."

This was the substance of what Master Byles Gridley got out of Kitty
Fagan. It was enough, yes, it was too much. There was some deep-laid
plot between Murray Bradshaw and Cynthia Badlam, involving the interests
of some of the persons connected with the late Malachi Withers; for that
the paper described by Kitty was the same that he had seen the young man
conceal in the Corpus Juris Civilis, it was impossible to doubt. If it
had been a single spot an the back of it, or two, he might have doubted.
But three large spots "blotches" she had called the