k, and the
landlord looked out papers from a box near the side window of his
snuggery, for the sake of the extra light. "I've got these papers together
for you," he said, as Hewitt entered. "Any news?"

"Nothing very great. Here's a bit of handwriting I want you to recognize,
if you can. Get a light."

Kentish lit a lamp, and Hewitt laid upon the table half a dozen small
pieces of torn paper, evidently fragments of a letter which had been torn
up, here reproduced in fac-simile:

[Illustration: six scraps of paper: mmy, throw them ou, right away, left
hi, hate his, lane wr]

The landlord turned the scraps over, regarding them dubiously. "These
aren't much to recognize, anyhow. _I_ don't know the writing. Where did
you find 'em?"

"They were lying in the lane at the back, a little way down. Plainly they
are pieces of a note addressed to some one called Sammy or something very
like it. See the first piece, with its 'mmy'? That is clearly from the
beginning of the note, because there is no line between it and the smooth,
straight edge of the paper above; also, nothing follows on the same line.
Some one writes to Crockett--presuming it to be a letter addressed to him,
as I do for other reasons--as Sammy. It is a pity that there is no more of
the letter to be found than these pieces. I expect the person who tore it
up put the rest in his pocket and dropped these by accident."

Kentish, who had been picking up and examining each piece in turn, now
dolorously broke out:

"Oh, it's plain he's sold us--bolted and done us; me as took him out o'
the gutter, too. Look here--'throw them over'; that's plain enough--can't
mean anything else. Means throw _me_ over, and my friends--me, after what
I've done for him! Then 'right away'--go right away, I s'pose, as he has
done. Then"--he was fiddling with the scraps and finally fitted two
together--"why, look here, this one with 'lane' on it fits over the one
about throwing over, and it says 'poor f' where its torn; that means 'poor
fool,' I s'pose--_me_, or 'fathead,' or something like that. That's nice.
Why, I'd twist his neck if I could get hold of him; and I will!"

Hewitt smiled. "Perhaps it's not quite so uncomplimentary, after all," he
said. "If you can't recognize the writing, never mind. But, if he's gone
away to sell you, it isn't much use finding him, is it? He won't win if he
doesn't want to."

"Why, he wouldn't dare to rope under my very eyes. I'd--I'd----"

"Well, w