"This is business, you know--this isn't an Old Cap' Collyer tale." "Well, anyway," resumed Billy, a little abashed, "I silenced the girl.

I threatened to have her transported for life if she breathed a word.
Mebbe she didn't suspect anything after all.

Tilly ain't so very bright.
So at length I continues my researches into every nook and cranny of the den, and jest as I was about to abandon the trail, baffled and beaten at every turn, what should I git but an idee to look at some papers lyin' in plain sight on the table at the head of the bed." "Well, out with it!" I thought Solon was growing a little impatient.

But Billy controlled the situation with a firm hand.
"It's an old trick," he continued, "one that's fooled many a better man than Billy Durgin--leavin' the dockaments carelessly exposed like they didn't amount to anything; but havin' the well-known tenacity of a bloodhound, I was not to be thwarted.

Well--to make a long story short--" Solon brightened wonderfully.
"I have to admit that my first suspicion was incorrect.