h if it _was_ all,
it's a rather coorious fact, for which ye might thank me for takin' the
trouble to tell you. But you're thankless by nature. It seems to me
that nother you nor me's likely to trouble Guy Foster to look arter
_our_ spare cash in that way! But that ain't the end o' my story yet."

"What! you didn't rob 'em? eh! you didn't pitch into the `Puppy,' and
ease him o' the shiners?"

Rodney Nick said this with a sneer, for he was well aware that his
boastful companion would not have risked a single-handed encounter with
Guy on any consideration.

"No, I didn't; it warn't worth the trouble," said Orrick, "but--you
shall hear. Arter the old man had said his say, Guy asked him if that
was all, for if it was, he didn't see no occasion to make no secret
about it."

"`No,' said the old man, `that's not all. I want you to take charge of
a packet, and give it to Bax after I'm gone. No one must break the seal
but Bax. Poor Bax, I'd thought to have seen him once again before I
went. I'll leave the old house to him; it ain't worth much, but you can
look arter it for him, or for Tommy Bogey, if Bax don't want it. Many a
happy evening we've spent in it together. I wanted to give you the
parcel here--here out on the dark Sandhills, where no one but God hears
us. It's wonderful what a place the town is for eavesdroppin'! so I
made you come out here. You must promise me never to open the packet
unless you find that Bax is dead; _then_ you may open it, and do as you
think fit. You promise me this?'

"`I do,' said Guy, as the old man pulled a small packet, wrapped in
brown paper, from his breast pocket, and put it into his hands. Then,
they rose and went away together."

"Well?" said Rodney Nick.

"Well!" echoed Long Orrick, "wot then?"

"What next? what d'ye want to do?" inquired Rodney.

"Do," cried Orrick, "I mean to get hold o' that packet if I can, by fair
means or by foul, _that's_ wot I mean to do, and I mean that you shall
help me!"

The reader may imagine what were the feelings of the poor old man as he
sat in the dark corner of the cave listening to this circumstantial
relation of his most secret affairs. When he heard Long Orrick's last
words, and felt how utterly powerless he was in his weakness to
counteract him in his designs, he could not prevent the escape of a deep
groan.

The effect on the two men was electrical. They sprang up, filled with
superstitious horror, and fled precipita