"Beg pardon, gentlemen," said Cousins more freely, when the other had left the room; "but I've known some of those country clerks that were the arrantest gossips in the whole neighbourhood. However the matter is, I hit upon what I think is the head of the right nail, when I was after the other business, do you see. You told me to enquire about the burning of the lady's house, and the silver plate that had disappeared; so, amongst other things, I went to the coach-office, and examined the books, and just about that time I found that there had been two parcels sent up to Amos Jacobs, Esq., to be left till called for. Now, thinks I, who can Amos Jacobs be, but the old Jew of the Scuttle-hole, as they call him. He receives stolen goods, gentlemen, and is as great a blind as ever swung. Well, I asked the book-keeper if he had noticed those two parcels; and he said yes, because they were so small, and yet so heavy. So then I asked who brought them; and he said a gentleman what had been lodging three doors down the street, for six weeks or so. So away I went; and, looking up at the house, I saw, 'Lodgings to Let' stuck up, and in I walked." "Mr. Beauchamp's lodgings, I dare say," said Dr. Wilton smiling. "No, no, sir!" replied Cousins, "I knew those before. They lie a good bit farther down. But an old woman came to show me the lodgings, thinking I was going to take them. So I asked her who had been in them before, and she up and told me all about it. A very nice gentleman she said he was, who was a great chemist she believed; for he was always puddling about over a fire, making experiments as he told her--but bless you, gentlemen! he was just making white soup of the lady's plate--that was what he was doing. So then I asked her his name, and she told me it was Mr. Anthony Smithson. So then the whole matter came upon me at once. Your worships must understand that, as far as I know of or remember, there is only one man upon the lay in London who has lost a bit of his finger; and not having seen him for some time, I had forgot all about him. His name is Tony Thomson--but sometimes people called him Billy Winter--and at times he took the name of Johnson--and Perkins too, I have heard him called--but the name he went by generally, a good while ago, was Tony Smithson." "But if the lodgings were to be let, he must of course be gone?" cried Dr. Wilton; "and we are as far off from the facts as ever."