ter on his return, furious at the news of his loss, had
marched over to Penzance under cover of darkness, broken in the
Custom House and carried off his goods again; and that Mr.
Pennefather next morning, examining the rifled stores, had declared
the nocturnal visitor to be John Carter beyond a doubt, because
Carter was an honest man and wouldn't take anything that didn't
belong to him. The Riding Officer thought this a highly amusing
story, and would often twit Mr. Pennefather with it. But Mr.
Pennefather could never see the joke, and would plead,--

"Well, but he _was_ an honest man, wasn't he?"

"That's the way with you Cornish," repeated Mr. Smellie; "and after a
time one learns to feel it in the air, so to speak."

The little Collector looked up from his ledger, pushing his
spectacles high on his brow, and glanced vaguely around the office.

"Now, for my part, I detect nothing unusual," said he.

"Furthermore," the Riding Officer went on, still tapping his boot,
"I met a suspicious-looking fellow yesterday on the Falmouth Road; a
deucedly suspicious-looking fellow; a fellow that answered me with a
strong French accent when I spoke to him, as I made it my business to
do. He had Guernsey merchant written all over him."

"Tattooed?" asked Mr. Pennefather, without looking up from the ledger
in which he had buried himself anew. "I had no idea they went to
such lengths . . . in Guernsey . . . and fourteen is twenty-seven,
and five is thirty-two, and thirty-two is two-and-eight. . . . I beg
your pardon? You identified him, then?"

Mr. Smellie frowned. "I shall send up a private note to the
Barracks; and meanwhile, I advise you to keep an eye lifting."

"And ten is three-and-six. . . . An eye lifting, certainly," assented
Mr. Pennefather, without, however, immediately acting on this advice.

"There's that fellow Hymen, now, next door. He's not altogether the
ass he looks, or my name's not Smellie."

"But it is, surely?" Mr. Pennefather looked up in innocent surprise.
"And you really think it justifies calling in the Dragoons?"

"On the face of it, no; I've no evidence. And yet, I repeat, there's
some mischief afoot. This new game of Hymen's, for instance--Before
coming down to these parts"--Mr. Smellie threw a fine condescension
into this phrase--"I should have thought it impossible that anyone in
the shape of a man, let alone of a Major of Artillery, could solemnly
propose to test a neighbouring corps