"Well, if I don't tell you, you manage to find out," answered Arthur. "But now, tell me how you have discovered what has puzzled us all so long. Where did you find the missing letter?"
"In our kitchen," answered Molly laughing.
And after her brother had puzzled over this reply for a minute or two, she said: "We gave Alice leave to have her cousin here this evening, and when I went out there to see they were not in mischief, Alice asked my advice for her cousin. She works at some paper-mill. It seems they have a great deal of waste-paper which they use up for something. And they employ girls to sort it, and this girl found a letter that had not been opened. But the post office order seems to have puzzled her, and she was so afraid that her fellow-workpeople might cheat her, that she brought it up to Alice to ask her advice, and Alice asked me."
"And what do you propose to do about it, Miss Moll? It is evidently a woman's question, or a girl's question, now."
"Yes, it is, and I am going to manage it my own way, and so you need not have anything to do with it unless you like."
"Thank you!" said Arthur mockingly.
"I am to meet this girl, Hester Piper, to-morrow about twelve o'clock near Brading's stores, and then I am going in with her, but she is to carry the letter, and when I have found Mr. Langley, she is to give him the letter and tell him where she found it."
"Capital!" said Arthur. "I could not do it much better myself."
"Well, now, I hope Mr. Langley won't be mean to the poor girl. I hope he will give her something for bringing it back; I have told her he would be sure to do this, so I hope he won't disappoint her."
"All right, Molly! I am sure they would not mind giving up all the money for the sake of having the affair satisfactorily cleared up. And I am glad, for Adrian's sake, that it has been found, not that it will make much difference to him now, for Fairmead has made up its mind that he is a bad lot, and I am glad he is not coming back to hear what people are saying about him. I had a letter from him this morning telling me about his life at the crammer's. He is very comfortable, he says, and is delighted at the idea of being a soldier. I shall write and tell him the letter was found at the paper-mill, and I know he will be glad, for he would not have been a bad fellow if Lady Mary had only known how to manage him."