"You was always d—d hard on me," Mixon said after a moment of sullen silence. "You don't take no account o' your family's spoilin' me. I was straight as a Christian before Breck got hold o' me. 'Tain't no fair twittin' on facts gener'ly; but you don't seem to remember that I know your brother-in-law wrote your name once, an' there warn't never nothin' done about it."
"Now you speak of it," returned the other unmoved, "I remember that Peter Mixon witnessed it. It seems to me rather longer than it is broad; for Breck is dead, and Mixon is living."
"But Breck's family ain't dead. You won't bedaub them in a hurry, I'm thinkin'; and you can't touch me 'thout you do them."
"We talked this all over when Breck died," Putnam said. "It will hardly pay to go over it again now. I want to know just what you and Frank are at."
"'Tain't nothin' that concerns you," the man said, sullenly yielding. "'Tain't nothin' but a paper his father gave me to keep, and he wants it."
"To keep for whom?"
"To keep for—for myself of course. 'Tain't at all likely he'd give me a paper for any one else."
"No, it is not," the lawyer remarked impartially; "and that is why I think you stole it."
"D—n you!" began Mixon, "I'm no more of a thief than Breck was. I'll"—
"There," Putnam interrupted, "that will do. Keep still, and let me see this paper, whatever it is."