"No, sir," replied he, "I don't know any more about this Boston letter than you do, and I haven't touched any letter but the Jamaica one."
"It is useless," said I, "for you to make such assertions, in the face of the probabilities in the case. You have confessed that you stole one letter, and that renders it the more likely that you have robbed the other."
"Perhaps it is likely," returned he, "but I didn't do it."
"Well," said I, "take your choice. If you persist in your denial, you must meet the consequences, and you know that this kind of offence is punished severely; but if you will own up, I will engage that you shall get off as easily as possible."
By such considerations I finally induced him to acknowledge his guilt in relation to the Boston letter, and on being questioned further, he stated that he still had the bills, and offered to show me the place where they were concealed. I at once started off, accompanied by him as my guide. We took a course which soon led us out of the city, and along the banks of the East River.
The day was rainy, and a mist overhung the river and the land. As we plodded along through the mud and wet, the face of my young companion was shaded with a sadness which indicated that the external world harmonized in its gloom with the little world within.
For myself, I must acknowledge that the prospect of reestablishing lost confidence among my fellow-employés in the post-office, and of putting an end to the suspicion which had haunted almost every one, as well as restoring the stolen property to its rightful owner, produced in me an exhilaration of spirits strangely at variance with all that met my eye. But as we continued to go on and on, with no signs of approaching our place of destination, I began to query with myself, whether my companion might not contemplate giving me the slip, after leading me a wild-goose chase. I could not see, indeed, what motive he could have for such a proceeding, unless he wished to vent his malice on me as one who had been prominent in detecting his misdeeds.
But he kept on steadily, till, after going half a mile or so beyond the old Penitentiary, (a distance of about three miles from the post-office,) he turned from the road and stopped before an old wooden house, apparently uninhabited. The exterior showed signs of many years' conflict with the elements, in which it had been decidedly worsted. Moss had gathered upon the shingles, and the paint, of which there was here and there a trace, strengthened by a feeble contrast the dark color of the parts from which it had been entirely washed away. Some of the windows were destitute of glass, and probably served as a mark for the "slings and arrows" of passing boys.
We entered the building, whose damp and musty-smelling air chilled me, heated as I was with my long and fatiguing walk, and ascending a flight of stairs, the boy unlocked the door of a room into which I passed by his request. The room contained no furniture but half a dozen chairs, a table, and an old bureau. This last he approached, unlocked, and taking out entirely one of the drawers, he showed another smaller one, which was behind the first when that was in place. Opening this, my eyes were refreshed with a sight of the four bills, of which I immediately took possession, and thinking it well to see what further discoveries I could make in this terra incognita. I found a little drawer, concealed like the first one behind another, and containing two or three hundred dollars in bills, which the precocious youth confessed to having purloined at different times from dead letters, which were usually laid out upon tables while the clerks were making up the dead letter account. It would seem that the boy thought no more of robbing a dead letter, than do the camp-followers of plundering dead men after a battle.
After examining the bureau as thoroughly as I was able, and finding no more of the ill-gotten wealth, I asked my companion whether he had any more money that did not belong to him, to which inquiry he returned a negative answer.