Page:The Millbank Case - 1905 - Eldridge.djvu/275

 the papers that related to the Public Lands Office and the timber land and stumpage in Range 16; the papers that involved some men very high in the State and in the party—I won't name them, if you please."

She nodded assent to each of his propositions, and when he had finished said:

"Yes; those are the papers I mean. I stole them from his desk and hid them. I was going to destroy them; but I thought sometime they might be of use and not so dangerous, and so I hid them."

"Where did you hide them?"

"First in the attic, then in the cellar, and finally under the bricks of the hearth in the parlour."

"It's easy, then, to find if they're still there."

Ten minutes sufficed to raise the bricks and show the hiding-place—a hollow cavity which had been devised in the early days for hiding purposes—empty.

"They are gone!" she cried as she glanced into the hole.

"Yes," said Trafford, replacing the bricks and leading her back to Wing's library, where they were