"Now comes the hardest part of my story. Don't clasp your hands and pray for me, as the worst sinner that ever was; for I a'n't quite that! Still, you think so much of a little fib, and listening, and breaking open seals, that I'd rather not write it if a great deep ocean of water wasn't rolling between you and me. Miss Hyde, I own it, lies a'n't my delight; but I can tell 'em. Peeping through keyholes and windows isn't my nature; but, anyhow, I did it. More than that: I never let one of Mrs. Dennison's letters leave our house without reading it. One or two letters I kept back altogether, because they were written in French, and I couldn't read that. They are with me here. It was to give them into Mr. Lee's hand that I came across the wide ocean. She suspected me—or her girl Cora did—and hired one of the men to mail them safely; but I knew a better way of bribing him to give them up. True, it made James jealous to see how thick I was with the man; but I couldn't help that.
"Babylon was cute, though; she wrote carefully. It was to some old friend—who was as bad as herself—to whom the letters were sent. I have some of her answers, too, as well as the journal; these were the papers that I laid before James Grant that night.
"I could only make out a word here and there in the French letters. If you hadn't been so crank about honor and all that, I would have brought them to you; I couldn't make up my mind to take the preaching. But I watched. You know, Miss Hyde, no dog ever kept watch as I did over that angel!
"She died. The worst came while I was wondering what to do. There was no use in telling what I had done. She was dead; and I thought then that the woman would go away and leave us to our mourning. If she came back again, I meant to give the journal up and have you read the French letters. You know how she left, and why it was Mr. Lee went off in that strange way; I could only guess. You wouldn't trust me; so I wouldn't trust you. But when I found that Babylon had gone chasing after Mr. Lee, just as his year of mourning was over, I followed her.
"I gave the journal and letters to James, and we read them over together. James reads French, and can turn it into English as easy as talking. So he gave me the English, which was a good deal like her journal, full of sin and iniquity."
CHAPTER LXXVI.
THE CASKET OF DIAMONDS.
"When we had read the letters and the journal, I tied them together, and sat down to talk the matter over with James, who is as good as a lawyer any day.
"'Where is our master now?' I said. 'What time is it?'