"I mean that I don't waste my time on easy ciphers invented by
fools."

She laid the slip of paper on his desk.

"Waste your time on _that_," she said satirically, "and see how
you like it!"

He examined it--first with his bleared red-rimmed eyes; then with
a magnifying-glass. The only expression of opinion that escaped
him was indicated by his actions. He shut up his book, and
gloated over the signs and characters before him. On a sudden he
looked at Mrs. Westerfield. "How did you come by this?" he asked.

"That's no business of yours."

"In other words, you have reasons of your own for not answering
my question?"

"Yes."

Drawing his own inferences from that reply, he showed his three
last-left yellow teeth in a horrid grin. "I understand!" he said,
speaking to himself. He looked at the cipher once more, and put
another question: "Have you got a copy of this?"

It had not occurred to her to take a copy. He rose and pointed to
his empty chair. His opinion of the cipher was, to all
appearance, forced to express itself by the discovery that there