“You old scoundrel, I didn’t, and you know I didn’t.

There, now!”

“Well, then, I b’lieve you. But answer me only jest this one more — now don’t git mad; didn’t you have it in your mind to hook the money and hide it?”

The duke never said nothing for a little bit; then he says:

“Well, I don’t care if I did, I didn’t do it, anyway. But you not only had it in mind to do it, but you done it.”

“I wisht I never die if I done it, duke, and that’s honest. I won’t say I warn’t goin’ to do it, because I was; but you — I mean somebody — got in ahead o’ me.”