his niece's attention to them.

"What do you think of that?" he demanded, triumphantly.

"Somebody's been up there," said his niece. "It isn't Emma, because she
hasn't been outside the house all day; and it can't be George, because he
promised me faithful he'd never go up there in his dirty boots."

Mr. Negget coughed, and approaching the stairs, gazed with the eye of a
stranger at the relics as Mr. Bodfish hotly rebuked a suggestion of his
niece's to sweep them up.

"Seems to me," said the conscience-stricken Mr. Negget, feebly, "as
they're rather large for a woman."

"Mud cakes," said Mr. Bodfish, with his most professional manner; "a
small boot would pick up a lot this weather."

"So it would," said Mr. Negget, and with brazen effrontery not only met
his wife's eye without quailing, but actually glanced down at her boots.

Mr. Bodfish came back to his chair and ruminated. Then he looked up and
spoke.

"It was missed this morning at ten minutes past twelve," he said, slowly;
"it was there last night. At eleven o'clock you came in and found Mrs.
Driver sitting in that chair."

"No, the one you're in," interrupted his niece.