roceeded to the little room;
Nancy turned the gas on, and then they inspected the imprisoned hand.
Mrs. James screamed with dismay, and Nancy asked her dryly whether she
was to blame for seizing a hand which had committed a manifest trespass.

"You have got the rest of his body," said she, "but this here hand
belongs to me."

"Lord, ma'am, what could he take out of your chimbley, without 'twas a
handful of soot? Do, pray, let me loose him."

"Not till I have said two words to him."

"But how can you? He isn't here to speak to--only a morsel of him."

"I can go into your house and speak to him."

Mrs. James demurred to that; but Nancy stood firm; Mrs. James yielded.
Nancy whispered her myrmidons, and, in a few minutes, was standing by the
prisoner, a reverend person in dark spectacles, and a gray beard, that
created commiseration, or would have done so, but that this stroke of
ill-fortune had apparently fallen upon a great philosopher. He had
contrived to get a seat under him, and was smoking a pipe with admirable
sang-froid.

At sight of Nancy, however, he made a slight motion, as if he would not
object to follow his imprisoned hand through the party-wall. It was only
for a moment; the next, he smoked imperturbably.

"Well, sir," said Nancy, "I hopes you are comfortable?"

"Thank ye, miss; yes. I'm at a double sheet-anchor."

"Why do you call me miss?"

"I don't know. Because you are so young and pretty."

"That will do. I only wanted to hear the sound of your voice, Joe Wylie."
And with the word she snatched his wig off with one hand, and his beard
with the other, and revealed his true features to his astonished
landlady.

"There, mum," said she, "I wish you joy of your lodger." She tapped the
chimney three times with the poker, and, telling Mr. Wylie she had a few
words to say to him in private, retired for the present. Mrs. James sat
down and mourned the wickedness of mankind, the loss of her lodger (who
would now go bodily next door instead of sending his hand), and the
better days she had by iteration brought herself to believe she had seen.

Wylie soon entered Nancy's house, and her first question was, "The 2,000
pounds, how did you get them?"

"No matter how I got them," said Wylie, sulkily. "What have you done with
them?"

"Put them away."

"That is all right. I'm blest if I didn't think they were gone forever."

"I wish they had never come. Ill-gotten money is a curse." Then she taxed
him