"I hain't got it with me."
"Nonsense! Let me see it."
"I hain't got it here, I tell yer. You never take no stock in nothin' I say, seems to me."
"That's true. What is this paper? and how came you by it?"
"He give it to me the night before he died. That old maid Mullen wanted to get it, but Breck he give it to me. 'You've always been a faithful frien' to me,' says he, 'an' you shall have it.' An' then he give it to me."
The lawyer looked at him with mingled amusement and disgust. Perfectly aware that the man was lying, he tried to decide upon what slight foundation of fact had been built this touching death-bed fiction. In his own mind Putnam connected this mysterious paper with the anxiety of his nephew Frank to force Ease Apthorpe to marry him, the mention of Miss Mullen's name giving to this some plausibility. Suddenly a new thought flashed through his mind.
"Is Mrs. Smithers mixed up in this business?" he asked.
Mixon, evidently startled, denied this so strongly, that his questioner was positive he had hit the truth, and insisted upon seeing the mysterious document. Peter stuck to his assertion that he did not have it with him, but at length promised to bring it on the following day for Putnam's inspection. And with this the lawyer was forced to content himself.
On the afternoon of this same day a pleasant little scene was enacted in the chamber of Burleigh Blood, that young man being at once actor and audience.
He had been trying on the dress he was to wear that evening, and his thoughts naturally turned from the robe to its maker. In his fancy rose a picture of the little maiden seated by his own fireside, or flitting about the house as its mistress. He felt his bosom glow, thinking how dear to him would be the traces of her presence, the sound of her voice. His heart grew warm with sweet languors at the dream of clasping her in his arms, of resting that tiny blonde head upon his breast. There is something inexpressibly touching in the love of a strong, pure man. Burleigh neither analyzed nor understood his own passion; but in manly, noble fashion, he loved Flossy with all the strength of his big heart.