Renshaw mechanically extended his hand to take it. Mr. Sleight dropped
the letter back into the drawer, which he quietly locked. The
apparently simple act dyed Mr. Renshaw's cheek with color, but it
vanished quickly, and with it any token of his previous embarrassment.
He looked at Sleight with the convinced air of a resolute man who had
at last taken a disagreeable step but was willing to stand by the
consequences.
"I _have_ changed my mind," he said coolly. "I found out that it was
one thing to go down there as a skilled prospector might go to examine
a mine that was to be valued according to his report of the
indications, but that it was entirely another thing to go and play the
spy in a poor devil's house in order to buy something he didn't know he
was selling and wouldn't sell if he did."
"And something that the man _he_ bought of didn't think of selling;
something _he_ himself never paid for, and never expected to buy,"
sneered Sleight.
"But something that _we_ expect to buy from our knowledge of all this,
and it is that which makes all the difference.
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