ou came
home."

He did not reply immediately; he was thinking. "Pens in that country
cut queer capers," he said. "Where are those letters, anyway?"

"Mother has put them away somewhere."

"I should like to see them again."

"Why?"

"Oh, on account of the memories they hold. Get them for me, and I will
give you a description of my surroundings at the time I wrote them."

"Why, what a funny fellow you are! Can't you give me a description
anyway?"

"No, not a good one."

"But I don't want to wake mother, and I don't know that I can find the
letters."

"Go and see."

"Oh, you are so headstrong."

She went out, and he walked up and down the room, and then stood again
at the window. Ellen returned.

"Here they are."

"Did you wake mother?"

"No, but I committed burglary. I found the key and unlocked her trunk,
and all to please you."

"Good, and for the first time burglary shall be repaid with
gratitude."

He took the letters and looked at the sprawling characters drawn by
the hand of his friend. "When I copied this confession," said he, "I
was heavy of heart. I was sitting in a small room, looking far down
into a valley where nature seemed to keep her darkness stored, and
from, another window, in the east, I could see a mountain where she
made her light."

"Go on," she said, leaning with her elbows on the table.

He began to walk across the room, from the door to the grate, and to
talk as one delivering a set oration. "And I had just finished my work
when a most annoying monkey, owned by the landlord, jumped through the
window. I was so startled that I threw the folded papers at him"--

"What have you done!" she cried.

He had thrown the letters into the fire, he sprang forward, and
snatching them, threw them on the hearth and stamped out the blaze.

"Oh, I do wish you hadn't done that," she said, hoarse with alarm.
"Mother reads these letters every day, and--oh, I _do_ wish you hadn't
done it! They are all scorched--ruined, and I wouldn't have her know
that I took them out of her trunk for anything. What shall we do about
it? Oh, I know you didn't mean to do it." He had looked appealingly at
her. "I wish I hadn't got them."

"It is only the copy of the confession that is badly burned. The
original is here on the table," he said.

"I know, but what good will that do? The letters are so scorched that
it won't do to return them."

"But I can copy them," he replied.

"Oh, you genius!" she ex