Again the eraser came into play to remove the cents after the figure “25.”  A comma and three zeros following it were inserted, followed by a new “00/100.”  The signature was left untouched.

Erasing the name of “Green & Co.,” presented greater difficulties, but it was accomplished with as little loss of the protective coloring on the surface of the check as possible.  Then after the “Pay to the order of” she wrote in, as her husband had directed, “The Carlton Realty Co.”

Next came the water color to restore the protective tint where the glass eraser and the acids had removed it.  There was much delicate matching of tints and careful painting in with a fine camel’s hair brush, until at last the color of those parts where there had been an erasure was apparently as good as any other part.

Of course, under the microscope there could have been seen the angry crisscrossing of the fibers of the paper due to the harsh action of the acids and the glass eraser.  Still, painting the whole thing over with a little resinous liquid somewhat restored the glaze to the paper, at least sufficiently to satisfy a cursory glance of the naked eye.

There remained the difficulty of the protective punch marks.  There they were, a star cut out of the check itself, a dollar sign and 25 followed by another star.

She was still admiring her handiwork, giving it here and there a light little fillip with the brush and comparing this check with some of those which had been practised on last night, to see whether she had made any improvement in her technique of forgery, when Carlton returned with the punch and the blank checks on the Gorham Bank.

From one of the blank checks he punched out a number of little stars until there was one which in watermark and scroll work corresponded precisely with that punched out in the original check.

Constance, whose fingers had long been accustomed to fine work, fitted in the little star after the $25, then took it out, moistened the edges ever so lightly with glue on the end of a toothpick, and pasted it back again.  A hot iron completed the work of making the edges smooth and unless a rather powerful glass had been used no one could have seen the pasted-in insertion after the $25.

Careful not to deviate the fraction of a hair’s breadth from the alignment Carlton took the punch, added three 0’s, and a star after the 25, making it $25,000.  Finally the whole thing was again ironed to give it the smoothness of an original.  Here at last was the completed work, the first product of their combined skill in crime: 

No. 15711.  Dec. 27,191—.  The Gorham National bank

Pay to the order of...  The Carlton Realty Co.

Twenty-five Thousand 00/100.........Dollars $25,000.00/100

W. J. Reynolds Co., per Chas. M. Brown, Treas.