One night, as I was debating with myself as to how I was to improve my position, I heard a knock on my shutter, and, going to the door, let in a broad-shouldered man with a white face and a great hooked nose. He wore a heavy black beard and mustache, and looked like the wolf in the pictures of Red Riding-Hood which I had seen as a child.
"Your name 's Sandcraft?" said the man, shaking the snow over everything. "Set down, want to talk to you."
"That's my name. What can I do for you?" said I.
The man looked around the room rather scornfully, at the same time throwing back his coat, and displaying a red neckerchief and a huge garnet pin. "Guess you 're not overly rich," he said.
"Not especially," said I.
"Know—Simon Stagers?"
"Can't say I do," said I. Simon was a burglar who had blown off two fingers when mining a safe, and whom I had attended while he was hiding.
"Can't say you do," says the wolf.
"Well, you can lie, and no mistake. Come now, Doctor, Simon says you 're safe, and I want to do a leetle plain talk with you." With this he laid ten eagles on the table; I put out my hand instinctively.
"Let 'em alone," cried the man sharply. "They 're easy earned, and ten more like 'em."