"Well, I was mad when I found he had got them papers; but the lawyer had left a message with my mother, saying if I came home, she was to tell me I'd hear something to my advantage by applying to him. So I went after him to the place where he lives; and sure enough there was Hopgood, and he and Clapp as thick as can be together. I guess they'd have liked it better if I had never showed myself again: but they got round me, and told me how it was all settled, and if I would only lend a hand, and keep quiet about Hopgood, and speak for them once in a while, they would enter into an agreement to give me enough to make a skipper of me at once. Them 'ere lawyers they can make black look like white—and so I agreed to it at last."
Hazlehurst strongly suspected that less persuasion had been necessary than the man wished him to believe.
"Did they tell you all their plan?"
"Pretty much all; they said it was easy to make people believe Hopgood was William Stanley, for he looked so much like the young man, that he had been asked if that wasn't his name. He said it was that first gave him the notion of passing off for William Stanley—that, and knowing all about the family, and the young man himself. He said Stanley had no near relations who would be likely to remember him; there was only one old gentleman they was afraid of, but they calculated they knew enough to puzzle him too. Hopgood had been practising after Stanley's handwriting; he was pretty good at that trade when he was a shaver," said Stebbins, with a look which showed he knew the story of the forgery. "He was bred a lawyer, and them 'ere lawyers are good at all sorts of tricks. Clapp and him had made out a story from my papers and what they know'd before, and got it all ready in a letter; they agreed that from the time of the wreck, they had better keep pretty straight to Hopgood's real life; and so they did."
"They seem to have laid all their plans before you."
"Well, they couldn't help it, for they wanted me to tell them all I heard from my brother; but I told 'em to speak first. They made out that Hopgood had a right to the property; for they said that old Mr. Stanley had no family to leave it to, that you was a stranger, and that Hopgood was a relation."
"This Hopgood, who first helped to corrupt William Stanley, even if he had actually been a near relation, would have been the last human being to whom Mr. Stanley would have left his property," said Harry, coolly. "But go on with your story; why did they not show the pocket-book before the trial?"
"They settled it so, because they thought it would look better before the jury."
"Why did you change your own mind so soon after the trial? You should have come to me before."
"Hopgood and I had a quarrel only three days ago, when he was drunk; he swore they could have done without me, and I swore I'd be revenged. Then that fellow, Clapp, wouldn't pay me on the spot according to agreement, as soon as they had gained the cause. I had kept my part, and he hadn't lifted a finger yet for me; nor he wouldn't if he could help it, for all he had given me his word. I know him from more than one thing that came out; he is one of your fellows who sham gentlemen, with a fine coat to his back; but I wouldn't trust him with a sixpence out of sight; no, nor out of arm's length," and Stebbins went on, swearing roundly at Clapp and Hopgood, until Harry interrupted him.