midnight
They are paper makers in France , who produce a smooth , very tough sheet , which , dear as it is , proves infinitely cheap compared with the fine vellum it deposed in a certain branch of industry . In Paris , years before , these sheets had given me the knowledge of how a gang of thieves disposed of their gold without melting it . The paper was used instead of vellum in the rougher processes of manufacturing gold-leaf . It stood the constant beating of the hammer nearly as well as the vellum , and here at once there flashed on me the secret of the old man 's midnight anvil work . He was transforming his sovereigns into gold-leaf , which must have been of a rude , thick kind , because to produce the gold-leaf of commerce he still needed the vellum as well as a ` clutch ' and other machinery , of which we had found no trace . ` My lord , ' I called to my assistant ; he was at the other end of the room ; ` I wish to test a theory on the anvil of your own fresh common sense . ' ` Hammer away , ' replied the earl , approaching me with his usual good-natured , jocular expression .