t of his mind
and was at work again.

"Yes, Keith, if you knew what information I have--"

Keith sat up suddenly.

"Go out of here!"

"If you'd only listen--"

Keith stood up, with a sudden flame in his eyes.

"Go on, I say. If you do not, I will put you out. It is as much as I can
do to keep my hands off you. You could not say a word that I would
believe on any subject."

"I will swear to this."

"Your oath would add nothing to it."

Plume waited, and after a moment's reflection began in a different key.

"Mr. Keith, I did not come here to sell you anything--"

"Yes, you did."

"No, I did not. I did not come--only for that. If I could have sold it,
I don't say I wouldn't, for I need money--the Lord knows how much I need
it! I have not a cent in the world to buy me a mouthful to eat--or
drink. I came to tell you something that only _I_ know--"

"I have told you that I would not believe you on oath," began Keith,
impatiently.

"But you will, for it is true; and I tell it not out of love for you
(though I never disliked--I always liked you--would have liked you if
you'd have let me), but out of hate for that--. That man has treated me
shamefully--worse than a yellow dog! I've done for that man what I
wouldn't have done for my brother. You know what I've done for him, Mr.
Keith, and now when he's got no further use for me, he kicks me out into
the street and threatens to give me to the police if I come to
him again."

Keith's expression changed. There was no doubt now that for once Quincy
Plume was sincere. The hate in his bleared eyes and bloated face was
unfeigned.

"Give me to the police! I'll give him to the police!" he broke out in a
sudden flame at Keith's glance of inspection. "He thinks he has been
very smart in taking from me all the papers. He thinks no one will
believe me on my mere word, but I've got a paper he don't know of."

His hand went to the breast of his threadbare coat with an angry clutch.
"I've got the marriage lines of his wife."

One word caught Keith, and his interest awoke.

"What wife?" he asked as indifferently as he could.

"His wife,--his lawful wife,--Squire Rawson's granddaughter, Phrony
Tripper. I was at the weddin'--I was a witness. He thought he could get
out of it, and he was half drunk; but he married her."

"Where? When? You were present?"

"Yes. They were married by a preacher named Rimmon, and he gave me her
certificate, and I swore to her I had lost it