"I should think you might see through the matter after I have explained it to you," said Sam, with some impatience.
"But you haven't explained it," answered Miles.
"That's so," admitted Sam, after reflecting a moment. "I'll do it now, while we walk along slowly. Stuart put this pocket-book in the drawer—for, as I told you, I saw him do it. He came into the shop for that very purpose. He is the fellow who has been stealing Mr. Smith's money, but he is trying his level best to fasten the guilt upon Oscar."
"Oh, I begin to understand the matter!" said Miles, his face flushing with indignation.
"Now the credit for the discovery I have made does not belong to me," continued Sam, who was as truthful and honest as he was blunt and fearless. "I never should have thought of it if it hadn't been for something Mr. Parker said to me. He told me the other day that if there had been any stealing going on in that store since Tom Preston left, Stuart was the guilty one; and the reason Mr. Parker suspected him was because he has had so much to say against Oscar. He has told everybody in town who would listen to him that Oscar was discharged for till-tapping; and there were a good many who would listen to him, for there are people everywhere, you know, who take unbounded delight in hearing others slandered. I had two reasons for watching every move Stuart made while he was in the shop. I thought it would be a good plan to keep an eye on him, and I was impatient to see him start for the door. I didn't want him there."
"It was a wonder he didn't see that you were watching him," observed Miles.
"Do you remember that broken looking-glass that hangs on the north wall of the shop?" asked Sam. "I looked in there and saw everything he did."
Miles was astonished at his companion's shrewdness, and could only look the admiration he felt for him.
"But what made you rush out of the shop in such a hurry?" he inquired at length. "Why didn't you tell Oscar all about it, and relieve his mind at once?"