l him where his wallet is. Then we
can up and tell all we know."

"Good! There's a jolly row coming!" said Wilkins, smacking his lips.

CHAPTER XVIII. THE MISSING WALLET IS FOUND.

Socrates Smith was, ordinarily, so careful of his money, that it was a
very remarkable inadvertence to leave it on the bureau. Nor was it long
before he ascertained his loss. He was sitting at his desk when his
wife looked in at the door, and called for a small sum for some domestic
expenditure.

With an ill grace--for Socrates hated to part with his money--he put his
hand into the pocket where he usually kept his wallet.

"Really, Mrs. Smith," he was saying, "it seems to me you are always
wanting money--why, bless my soul!" and such an expression of
consternation and dismay swept over his face, that his wife hurriedly
inquired:

"What is the matter, Mr. Smith?"

"Matter enough!" he gasped. "My wallet is gone!"

"Gone!" echoed his wife, in alarm. "Where can you have left it?"

Mr. Smith pressed his hand to his head in painful reflection.

"How much money was there in it, Socrates?" asked his wife.

"Between forty and fifty dollars!" groaned Mr. Smith. "If I don't find
it, Sophronia, I am a ruined man!"

This was, of course, an exaggeration, but it showed the poignancy of the
loser's regret.

"Can't you think where you left it?"

Suddenly Mr. Smith's face lighted up.

"I remember where I left it, now," he said; "I was up in the chamber an
hour since, and, while changing my coat, took out my wallet, and laid it
on the bureau. I'll go right up and look for it."

"Do, Socrates."

Mr. Smith bounded up the staircase with the agility of a man of half
his years, and hopefully opened the door of his chamber, which Jim had
carefully closed after him. His first glance was directed at the bureau,
but despair again settled down sadly upon his heart when he saw that it
was bare. There was no trace of the missing wallet.

"It may have fallen on the carpet," said Socrates, hope reviving
faintly.

There was not a square inch of the cheap Kidderminster carpet that he
did not scan earnestly, greedily, but, alas! the wallet, if it had ever
been there, had mysteriously taken to itself locomotive powers, and
wandered away into the realm of the unknown and the inaccessible.

Yet, searching in the chambers of his memory, Mr. Smith felt sure that
he had left the wallet on the bureau. He could recall the exact moment
when he laid it