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Lock-box No. 82 was constructed on the same principle in miniature, the letter-slit being placed in such a position that anything deposited in the box fell behind the mirrors, the whole interior remaining apparently visible through the glass front, and presumably empty. The owner of the box would naturally glance into it before actually using his pass-key.
But no answer came. John had gone away somewhere for indefinite hours and the door was locked. So Oscar wrote: "Called, two p.m.," on a scrap of envelope, signed his name, and put it through the letter-slit. It crossed his mind to hunt other pupils for his vacant time, but he decided against this at once, and returned to his own room.
Then the flap of the letter-box lifted itself every one saw it by the flickering light of the gas-lamp that shone through the leafless lime-tree by the gate a golden eye seemed to wink at them through the letter-slit, and a cautious beak whispered 'Are you alone? 'It's the Phoenix, said every one, in a voice so joyous, and so full of relief, as to be a sort of whispered shout.
Following Radbourn's direction he passed up a narrow, incredibly grimy stairway, and knocked at a door at the end of a hall, whose only light came through the letter-slit in the door. "Come in!" yelled a snarling voice. Bradley entered timidly, for the voice was not at all cordial. The Judge, in his own den, was a different man from the Judge at Robie's grocery, and this day he was in bad humor.
Then he went on, parrot-like: "I've been putting the letters and telegrams through the letter-slit, as you told me to, and I've kept the private office locked." "Nevertheless it is very evident that somebody has been here," said Blount. Then he had a sudden shock and wheeled shortly upon the stenographer.
During the afternoon he had not failed in his punctuality; two more neat witnesses to this lay on the door-mat beneath the letter-slit of Billy's room, And at the appointed hour after dinner a third joined them, making five.
These he hung like curtains at one corner of the room, and placed a chair behind them raised on two empty packing-boxes. Seating himself in this chair he opened the curtains just enough to enable him to peep through, and found that he could see the letter-slit in the door over the counter, but not the floor beneath it. He therefore elevated his throne by means of another packing-box.
When the Kerrs had been housekeeping for a week, the butcher and baker and the rest of the clan each dropped through the letter-slit in the front door of No. 30 a very clean, spruce, new book, and the young wife gathered them up with eager trepidation.
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