Dennis Wayman sat watching him for some minutes in thoughtful silence. The intent gaze with which he regarded the face of his friend, was that of a man who was by no means inclined to believe every syllable he had heard. After Milsom had devoured about a pound of steak, and at least two pounds of potatoes, Mr. Wayman ventured to interrupt his operations by a question. "If you didn't collar the money, what became of it?" he asked. "Put away," returned the other man, shortly; "and as safe as a church, unless my bad luck goes against me harder than it ever went yet." "You hid it?" said Wayman, interrogatively. "I did." "Where?" Mr. Milsom looked at his friend with a glance of profound cunning. "Wouldn't you like to know--oh, wouldn't you just like to know, Mr. Wayman?" he said. "And wouldn't you just dose me with a cup of drugged coffee, and cut off to ransack my hiding-place while I was lying helpless in your hospitable abode. That's the sort of thing you'd do, if I happened to be a born innocent, isn't it, Mr. Wayman? But you see I'm not a born innocent, so you won't get the chance of doing anything of the kind." "Don't be a fool," returned Dennis Wayman, in a surly tone. "You'll please to remember that one half of Valentine Jernam's money belongs to me, and ought to have been in my possession long before this. I was an idiot to trust it in your keeping." "You trusted it in my keeping because you were obliged to do so," answered Black Milsom, "and I owe you no gratitude for your confidence. I happened to know a Jew who was willing to give cash for the notes and bills of exchange; and you trusted them to me because it was the only way to get them turned into cash." The landlord of the 'Jolly Tar' nodded a surly assent to this rather cynical statement. "I saw my friend the Jew, and made a very decent bargain," resumed Milsom. "I hid the money in a convenient place, intending to bring you your share at the earliest opportunity. I was lagged that very night, and had no chance of touching the cash after I had once stowed it away. So, you see, it was no fault of mine that you didn't get the money." "Humph!" muttered Mr. Wayman. "It has been rather hard lines for me to be kept out of it so long. And now you have come back, I suppose you can take me at once to the hiding place. I want money very badly just now." "Do you?" said Thomas Milsom, with a sneer. "That's a complaint you're rather subject to, isn't it--the want of money? Now, as I've answered your questions, perhaps you'll answer mine. Has there been much stir down this way while I've been over the water?" "Very little; things have been as dull as they well could be." "Ah! so _you'll_ say, of course. Can you tell me whether any one has lived in my old place while my back has been turned?" The landlord of the 'Jolly Tar' started with a gesture of alarm. "It wasn't _there_ you hid the money, was it?" he asked, eagerly. "Suppose it was, what then?"