“The scoundrels!”
“They got away with five or six tricks of the sort. At last it was discovered that they were the culprits and they were prosecuted on fresh charges. They asked one of them: ‘Who wrote this?’ So one of them answered, ‘I’. Then they asked the other, ‘Who wrote this?’ And he too answered, ‘I.’ They simply couldn’t discover which it really was. Then it occurred to the judge to have each of them put into a separate room and made to write the letter through which they had learned that a burial was being prepared. And, boy! The two wrote in the same handwriting, and even made the same erasures. Just imagine how clever that fellow must be, if several times, when there have been balls and banquets at the Royal Palace, he has forged invitations, has put on a dress suit and gone off to the king’s residence, rubbing elbows with dukes and marquises.”
“The deuce you say!” exclaimed Manuel, with admiration. “And is his companion of the Saladero still living?”
“No. I believe he died in America.”
“Has the Master ever been to America?”
“He’s been everywhere. He’s travelled over half the globe, and in every corner of it he has left behind him some ten or a dozen forgeries.”
“He must be rich.”
“You just bet.”
“And what does he do with his money?”
“That’s something I don’t know. He doesn’t go in much for good times, nor has he any women. The Cripple told me once that the Master has a daughter who’s being brought up in France, and that he would leave her a fortune.”