The coat seemed to resist every effort and trick of mine, as if it still served its old master and were stubbornly resolved to protect him against a stranger's prying; but at last a sharp jerk made a stitch give way. After that the rest was easy. I wrenched the pocket half out, and that once done I was able with both hands to tear the lining down nearly its whole length. Then I thrust my hand between it and the cloth, and touched a crumpled piece of paper. I dreaded while I longed to look at what I had discovered: for I realized that in all human probability I was about to suffer a crushing disappointment. This lost scrap of paper might prove to be part of some torn, irrelevant letter of long ago; or it might be an American greenback, or a forgotten memorandum. As I withdrew my hand--the paper in it--involuntarily I shut my eyes, as if shrinking from a blow. But I scolded myself for cowardly weakness, and opened my eyes again to see a folded, refolded, and crumpled piece of khaki-coloured paper ruled with blue lines. Then I knew that, from the first faint crackling which I had felt rather than heard, I had been sure in my heart of finding this thing: sure that I had always been meant by Fate to find it. With cold and shaking fingers I cautiously unfolded the paper without tearing it. Yes! It was a leaf torn from a notebook--the khaki notebook I had given Eagle. One page was blank. The other was almost covered with writing, scribbled with blue pencil, a pencil which must have been rather blunt, because the marking was heavy, though it showed signs of haste. No one familiar with Eagle March's hand could have failed to recognize it as his, rough and hurried as was the scrawl. At the top of the page was jotted down the date of that unforgettable night at El Paso. "Have just received by your orderly verbal command to fire nos. one and two guns, aiming beyond Mexican end of bridge. I beg if this is correct that you repeat order in writing. "MARCH." Here was the evidence which would have saved Eagle at his court-martial and proved Major Vandyke a liar and blackguard. He had, no doubt, crushed the incriminating paper into the deepest depths of his breast-pocket, perhaps covering it up with other things lest it should flutter away and betray him. There had been no time to destroy the paper at that moment, and so he had put off disposing of it until after his famous rush across the Rio Grande had been safely accomplished. When he returned and could get back to his own tent, his first thought must have been of the document whose existence he meant to deny. To empty his pocket and find the paper gone must have been a frightful blow, and Sidney could hardly have known a peaceful moment until after the court-martial, when all danger of the lost message coming to light seemed to be past forever.