e so
many little details. It took a lot of practice--these things do--an'
then I had to remodel the inside of the desk--shorten up the drawers,
an' make room for myself behind them. Luckily I'm little, an' the desk
was one of the biggest I ever saw."

"So you were in the desk?" I asked.

"Sure," he chuckled. "Where else? Lookin' at you out of one of the
pigeon-holes, an' wonderin' if I'd better risk it."

"And you decided you would?"

"Yes," said Jemmy slyly; "I saw you were scart to death, an' I was
afraid if I didn't demonstrate for the old lady, I wouldn't get the
money."

"How did you know she had it?"

"I heard you tell her you'd brought it, down in the parlor."

"Oh," I said; "then it was your step I heard in the hall?"

"I guess so, if you heard one. I just had time to get upstairs an'
make my plant before you came in. The rest was easy."

"But the ashes?" I said.

"Flicked out through a pigeonhole. That's what took practice, to make
'em fall just right. Also the cigar."

"And the odor of tobacco?"

He got a little vial out of his pocket, uncorked it, and again I
caught the sweet and heavy odor of Peter Magnus' cigar.

"An' here's a fine point I'm proud of," said Jemmy. "I had this made
from half a dozen of Magnus' cigars I found in a box in his room. So
the smell was just right. I thought for a while of showin' some smoke,
but didn't dare risk it."

"But the note," I said. "That was the cleverest of all."

Jemmy chuckled and glanced at Godfrey.

"You'll understand that, Jim," he said. "You remember I worked it
backward in that National City Bank case."

Godfrey nodded.

"I remember the signature disappeared from old Murgatroyd's check."

"Backward or forward, it don't make no difference. It all depends on
the acid."

"What acid?"

"Ah," chuckled Jemmy, "you'd like to know, wouldn't you? You never
will. But it all depends on it. If I put the acid in before the salt,
the writin' disappears at the end of two hours; if I put the salt in
before the acid, the writin' don't appear for the same length of time.
It took me five years to work it out."

"But the writing didn't all appear at once," I objected.

"Of course not," said Jemmy impatiently. "It wasn't all wrote at once,
was it? It appeared just like it was wrote."

"How could you time it?"

"Why," answered Jemmy still more impatiently, "I began operations
at the same time every night, didn't I? I timed the writin' for
eight-forty