Chapter V: Part 5

CHARLES LEGATE--A FORGER--STUDYING HIM UP--FIFTY THOUSAND
DOLLARS, HIS "PRIZE"--DESCRIPTION OF LEGATE--NO TWO PERSONS
EVER AGREE IN DESCRIBING ANOTHER--A MARK HIT UPON--START FOR
ST. LOUIS--MUSINGS--CURIOUS INCIDENTS OF MY JOURNEY--A
GENEALOGICAL "DODGE"--ON LEGATE'S TRACK AT LAST--ST. LOUIS
REACHED--OF MY STAY THERE--LEAVE FOR NEW ORLEANS PER STEAMER--A
GENIAL CROWD OF MEN AND WOMEN ON BOARD--CHARACTERISTICS OF A
MISSISSIPPI "VOYAGE"--NAPOLEON, ARKANSAS--SOME "CHARACTERS"
COME ON BOARD THERE--A GAMBLING SCENE ON BOARD--ONE JACOBS
TAKES A PART--A PRIVATE CONFERENCE WITH JACOB'S NEGRO
SERVANT--A TERRIFIC FIGHT ON BOARD AMONG THE GAMBLERS--JACOBS
SET UPON, AND MAKES A BRAVE DEFENCE--HOW I DISCOVERED "JACOBS"
TO BE PROBABLY LEGATE, IN THE MELEE--HE IS BADLY BRUISED--HIS
LIFE DESPAIRED OF--WE ARRIVE IN NEW ORLEANS--JACOBS'
IDENTIFICATION AS LEGATE--LEGATE PROVES TO BE VERY RICH--A
CURIOUS VISIT TO AN ITALIAN ARTIST'S STUDIO--A NOVEL MEDICINE
ADMINISTERED TO SIGNORE CANCEMI, THE SICK ARTIST--HE GETS WELL
AT ONCE.

Early in my detective life, when I was more ready than now to accept business which might lead me far from home, I was commissioned by a New York mercantile house to go to St. Louis first, and "anywhere else thereafter on the two continents" (as the senior member of the house _fervently_ defined my latitude) where my thread might lead, to work up a subtle case of forgery to the amount of about fifty thousand dollars, out of which the house had been defrauded by one Charles Legate, a Canadian by birth, but combining in himself all the craft of an Italian, with the address of the politest Frenchman, and the bold perseverance and self-complacency of a London "speculator." The task before me was a difficult one, and at that time more than now I craved "desperate jobs," entering into them with an enthusiasm proportioned to the trials and dangers they involved.

After a thorough study in every particular of the correspondence between Legate and the house, which covered a long period of time, and in which was disclosed to me, as I thought, a pretty clear understanding of the man in all his various moods and systems of fraudulent pursuit, and having gathered from the members of the house every particular in regard to the personal appearance of Legate, of which they could possess me, I started on my mission. The house had been unable for some time to get any word from Legate, or any tidings of his recent whereabouts from others; so we felt certain that I should not find him at St. Louis, the point from which they had last heard from him, and where they had evidence he had for some weeks resided; so I was even unusually particular in my inquiries of the firm as to Legate's mode of dress, the peculiarities of his manner, and all possible personal indices. Legate was one of those men whom it is difficult to describe, being of medium height, having black eyes and black hair, a nose neither large nor small, mouth of medium size, teeth the same, nothing peculiar about his cast, and his complexion sometimes quite light, at others "reddish." There's nothing more difficult to determine by inquiry from others than a man's complexion, no two persons seeing it alike. He dressed neither gaudily nor carelessly, and though my informants all agreed that he was a man of consummate address, yet none of them could by imitation give me any definite representation of his manner.

Almost in despair of learning anything at all definite about his personnel, which might enable me to identify Legate, I finally said, "Gentlemen, almost everybody is in some way deformed or ill-formed--nose a little to one side--one foot larger than the other, leading to a habit of standing on it more firmly than on the other--one shoulder higher than the other--an arm a little out of shape--hand stiff--fingers gone, or something of the sort."

"See here," exclaimed Mr. Harris, a junior member of the firm, interrupting me, and resting his face pensively for a half minute on his hand, the elbow of which was pressed upon the table at which we sat. "Ah, yes; I have it. You've hit the nail on the head. I remember noticing once, when Legate dined with me at Delmonico's, that the end, or about half, of his little finger of the left hand was gone. He doesn't show it much. I remember I looked a second time before I fully assured myself that what I first thought I discovered was so. He is as adroit about concealing that, as he is in his general proceedings." I felt great relief to learn so much, and bidding my employers good day, found myself, as speedily as I well could, on the way to St. Louis, taking my course up the river, and on viâ the New York Central Railroad. I suppose that it is the fact with every business man when travelling in the pursuit of his occupation, either as a merchant going to the big cities to buy goods, the speculator hunting out a good investment somewhere in real estate,--no matter what the business,--to be more or less occupied in thought regarding it. But no man has half or a tenth part so much occasion for constant weariness about his business as has the detective officer, whether he be in pursuit of an escaped villain, working up a civil case, searching for testimony in a given cause, or what not; for however deep his theories, or well laid his plans, some accident or incident, apparently trifling in itself, may occur to give him in a moment more light than he might otherwise obtain in a month's searching and study--a fact which is ever uppermost in my mind when in the pursuit of my calling, and I endeavor to turn everything possible to account. It so happened, that when along about Syracuse on the cars, I overheard some men, who were evidently enjoying each other's society greatly in the narration of stories and experiences, saying something about "home" and St. Louis; and I fancied they were, as proved to be the case, residents of that city; and I became consequently quite interested in them, hoping that something would occur on their way to allow me, without obtrusion, to make their acquaintance; for they were both men who apparently know "what is going on around them," and very possibly might know Legate, or something about him, which might serve me. Indeed, I half fancied that one of them might be Legate himself; for he would answer the description given me of that person as well as anybody I should be apt to find in a day's travel; and I was more than half confirmed in my suspicions, as you can readily surmise, when I discovered that the traveller was lacking the little finger, or nearly all of it, on the left hand! Of course, thus aroused, I became very watchful, and devised various plans of getting into the acquaintance of the gentlemen as soon as might be. But the cars rolled on and on, and no chance occurred to place myself in their immediate presence, although I walked up and down the aisle of the cars, occasionally lingering by this or that seat, and passing a word with the occupants; but somehow I could not get at the men in question in this or any other like way; but I kept myself as much as possible within hearing of their ludicrous, comical, or exciting stories, over which, at times, they laughed immoderately.

Eventually, as the cars were starting on from a station at which we stopped for a moment, there came on board a fine, brusque, jolly, but courtly-looking man, of that class who bear about them the unmistakable evidences of good breeding, frankness, and honor, and whose associates are never less than respectable people, and who, as he brushed down the aisle of the car in search of a seat, accosted the man upon whom in particular I had my eye,--

"Ah, Mr. Hendricks! I am very glad to meet you," extending his hand and giving him a cordial grasp and "shake" which assured me that the man Hendricks was a very different character from the Mr. Legate in search of whom I was making my journey; and so my "air castles," founded upon suspicion, came to the ground. I know not why, but I really felt a relief to find that it was not Legate, after all, notwithstanding it would have been a happy circumstance for me, had Mr. Hendricks really been he.

But I listened still to the St. Lousians' story-telling, which grew more and more loud as we moved on, in consequence, I suppose, of their occasional attention to a little flask of wine which each gentleman carried; but they did not become boisterous. Mr. Hendricks was narrating to his friend,--whose name by this time I had discovered to be Phelps,--what was evidently an intensely interesting story to the latter, when he, striking his hand very heavily upon his leg, exclaimed, "That Legate was one of the most accomplished villains--no softer word will do--that I ever heard of."

"Ah, ha!" I thought to myself, "now I am in the right company to get a clew to the fellow. But stop; he said "was," not _is_. I wonder if Legate is dead: perhaps he is; and I became quite fearful that he might be, and so my mission prove entirely fruitless. But I could see no chance to break in upon their conversation, here, or make their acquaintance. "_That_ Legate," too, might also be another than the Charles Legate, whom I was seeking. What shall I do? and I pondered over the matter. Finally I made the bold resolution to interrupt the gentlemen at the first half-favorable opportunity, my seat being one back of theirs, on the other side of the car, and so near that I might do so quite readily. While talking of this man Legate, their conversation was, in the main, more subdued, and as if half confidential, than upon other topics, which made it the more difficult for me to interpolate a query, for I had by this time resolved upon my plan.

Presently I heard Mr. Hendricks say, "The last I heard of him, he'd gone to Mexico." I fancied this must relate to Legate, and began to think that my journey might indeed extend "over the two continents," according to my conditional orders on starting. Presently I heard the name Legate, and as Messrs. Hendricks and Phelps were at this time in the height of their jolly humor, I fancied they wouldn't mind the obtrusion. I stepped from my seat to theirs, and said, "Gentlemen, you'll pardon me, but I am somewhat interested in the genealogy of the Legate family both at the west and east; and just hearing you speak the name Legate, it occurred to me that perhaps I could get a new name to add to my list. Is it a gentleman of the western branch of whom you were speaking?"

"O, no, sir," replied Mr. Hendricks; "the man we were speaking of doesn't belong to the United States at all. He was (and is, if alive) a Canadian, who lived for a while at St. Louis. Are you a Legate, sir, or a relative of the family? allow me to ask."

"No, sir; simply a general genealogist. You know all men have their weaknesses: genealogical studies are among mine."

"I asked," said he, "because, if your name was Legate, you might have been offended, if I had told you that the Legate we were talking about wouldn't add any grace to your family list."

"Ah, ha! then I infer that he might have been at least a man of bad habits--perhaps a dishonest one."

"Well, the public opinion in St. Louis is, that this man Legate wasn't very honest, however good his general habits may have been."

"I am sorry," said I, "that any member of the Legate family anywhere should bring disgrace upon the name; but we can't always help these things--a pretty good family generally throughout the country, I find. Permit me to ask, what was this Legate's first name? perhaps I have heard of him before."

"Charles," said Mr. Hendricks; "or familiarly, among his old acquaintances, 'Charley Black Eyes Legate,' to distinguish him from a blue-eyed gentleman by the same name. His French friends, too,--there are a great many French-speaking people in St. Louis,--called him 'Charley _Noir_' (Black--short for black eyes.)"

Having learned so much, I was not anxious to press my inquiries, at that time, beyond simply asking if he was still residing in St. Louis, and was assured that he had departed--nobody knew to what point--nine months before. I managed, before we arrived in St. Louis, to make the further acquaintance of these gentlemen, without letting them at all into my business; indeed, so cordial had they become as to insist on calling on me the next day after my arrival at the Planter's Hotel, and giving me a long ride about the city.

During the ride I referred to Legate, and learned from them that he was a swindler and a gambler; that for a while he moved in the best society in St. Louis, and was thought a "pink of a man," possessing good manners, and being an unusually interesting colloquist and story-teller. He was considerable of a "romancer among the ladies," said Hendricks.

"Better say necromancer; that would be nearer the truth," suggested Mr. Phelps.

"O," said I, "a man given, in short, to wine, women, and cards, you mean?"

"Yes, exactly; but a man might be all that, and not be a Legate," responded Hendricks. "The fact is, sir, this Legate is a most unscrupulous villain--a man who would hesitate at nothing. If I am rightly informed, he made a murderous assault in New Orleans once upon an old friend who happened to cross him in some way. It was in that encounter, Phelps, that he lost his finger, I've heard."

I could no longer have any doubt that I was on the right track, and I felt that there could be no danger in confiding my special business in St. Louis to these men, who might be able to give me great assistance, possibly. So I told them that I was hunting this same Charles Legate, of the frauds he had perpetrated upon the New York house, and that I wished to find him within a given time in order to secure a certain amount of property in Canada, which, after a certain period, would be so disposed of as to be of no avail to my employers, and that I was willing to give any reasonable amount for information which might enable me to reach him.

My friends told me that they thought my case an almost hopeless one, that Legate's sagacity could outwit the very d----l, and that he was the most uncertain man to "track" in the world; but they would do all in their power to find out who were his principal associates, during the last of his stay in St. Louis, the time, as near as might be determined, when he left, and what course he took. They had heard that he had gone to Mexico; but that was probably only a "blinder."

I staid in St. Louis five days, prosecuting my inquiries; but all I could learn of any import was, that the last which was known of Legate in St. Louis, he was constantly with a certain pack of gamblers, of rather a desperate order, and that, with his quick temper, it was possible that he had got into a fight (as some had suspected), and been made way with--possibly thrown into the Mississippi. This was not decidedly encouraging, and I was on the point of writing back to my employers that it was useless to search for Legate longer at that time; that they would have to trust to some future accident to reveal him, if still alive, indeed. But having another affair on hand at the same time, which necessarily called me to New Orleans before returning to New York, I thought better of the matter, and merely wrote to my New York friends, that having gotten all possible clew to Legate in St. Louis, I should take boat next day for New Orleans, from which point they would hear from me duly.

The next afternoon I took the steamer "Continental," after having made all arrangements with my new friends in St. Louis to apprise me if ever Legate "turned up" in that city; and down the mighty Mississippi the proud boat bore me and a large number of the most cheerful, genial, and hearty men and women I ever travelled with. There's a certain frankness and generosity about the western and southern people which captivated me, when I first went among them, at once; but though I had often been in the west, I had never encountered a finer class of travellers than departed with me that day from St. Louis, on board the well-tried steamer Continental.

Nothing special, save the usual jollity, mirth, good living, copious drinking, and lively card-playing, which characterized a "voyage down the Mississippi," especially in those days, occurred, and being not over well, I kept my berth considerably--until our arrival at Napoleon, Arkansas, where we stopped to "wood up" and take on passengers, accessions of whom we had had all along our course, at every stopping-place. At Napoleon quite a concourse came on, mainly of not well-to-do people, mostly migrating to Texas in order to better their worldly condition, as they thought. Poor fellows! I fear many of them found themselves doomed to disappointment. But to my story. Among the on-comers at Napoleon were three men of marked individualities. They came aboard separately. One of them was quite large and comely, neatly dressed, in the style then prevailing at the North; nothing about him but certain provincialisms of speech to indicate that he might not be a northern man. The other two wore long hair, and beards, and slouched hats, and had the air of well-to-do planters of middle age. One of them was accompanied by a negro, the most obsequious of all his race, and who, whenever ordered by his master to do anything, always took great care to indicate his willingness to obey by saying, very obsequiously, "Yes, Massa Colonel," or "Yes, Massa Jacobs;" by which fact I of course learned what the negro supposed, at least, his master's name to be, but there was something about this man's appearance which excited my suspicion, at first, that he might not be a planter, after all.

It was near nightfall when we departed from Napoleon and it was not long after the cabin was lighted up that the usual card-playing was resumed; and these three men crowded, with others, round the tables, to look on at first, and of course to take part when occasion might offer. Jacobs was particularly observant of the games as they proceeded. Although I saw that he had peculiar talents for the gaming-table, I wondered why he lingered so long before taking a hand. But he was biding his time. The bar, of course, was pretty well patronized, and the finest looking of the three men in question grew apparently more and more mellow. The stakes at this time were not large, but the players were waxing more and more earnest, when this man--assuming to be slightly intoxicated--exclaimed, "Gentlemen, I say, I say--do you hear me?--that this fun is rather slow. Is there anybody here that wants to play for something worth while? See here," said he, "strangers, please let me draw up my seat," pushing his chair up between those of two players; "see here; there's a cool two thousand, that I want to double or lose to-night," and poured from a red bag a heap of gold, over a portion of which he clapped his large hand. "I am in for it. Is there anybody that wants to make this money?"

"Well, stranger," said Jacobs, "when these players can give us room, I'm your man; that is, till my pile's gone. 'Tain't so big as yours, and it ought to go for a new nigger down to Orleans. I must have another hand; but your challenge is rather provoking, I must confess, and I don't care if I try you."

The players, moved by that curiosity which such a proceeding between "strangers" would be apt to excite, politely made room for the combatants, and in their turn became lookers on. The large man played well, but he was (apparently) intoxicated, and now and then "bungled," giving the game into Jacobs' hands at times. My curiosity about Jacobs was, I know not really why, constantly increasing, and when the third of that trio had entered the lists with a partner, I managed to slip out down to the lower deck, where Jacobs had ordered his servant, and fall into conversation with him.

"Are you Mr. Jacobs' nigger?"

"Yes, massa; I'se Massa Jacobs' body sarvant."

"Your master's a jolly fellow--isn't he? He's a planter, I suppose--has a great number of "hands"--hasn't he?"

"No, Massa Jacobs don't plant. He's a banker, or a specumater, as they call um up there."

"Up where?"

"Little Rock--we lives about five miles wess of Little Rock."

"O, then he don't plant. What do those speculators do? I never heard of them before."

"O, massa, you's quare--ain't you? You never knows about the specumaters? That's quare."

"But tell me what they do;" and the darky, turning up the whites of his eyes in a most inimitable manner, and cocking his head to one side, while he put his big hands into the attitude of one about to shuffle cards, went through the motions of dealing off cards with a celerity that indicated that he, too, might be a "specumater," as he doubtless was, among the darkies, having taken lessons in his master's office.

When he had finished this exhibition, he whirled about on his heel in true negro style, and with great glee shuffled a half dozen steps, and ended with an air of triumph, which indicated to me that he thought his master a great man. The slaves used, despite all they might suffer from a cruel master, to take great pride in him if he excelled in anything, or was a noted man.

"Your master's a great speculator, then? I reckon I had not better try him, eh?"

"Tell troof, massa, I reckon dare's nobody on dis heah boat that can beat massa;" and he looked very serious, and spoke low, as if kindly warning me.

I had learned enough, and proceeded to the cabin, and watched the play. For a while Jacobs played with the large "stranger," sometimes losing a little, sometimes winning more, and at last gave up the play, having won quite a sum.

Noting Jacobs' success, and the "stranger," too, having ordered on sundry glasses of liquor during the play, and having become apparently more heedless, others anxiously sought his place. A party of four was made up, and the large "stranger" and the third one formed two as partners. Jacobs posted himself where he could signal to the large "stranger," who, with his partner, went on now winning great successes. Frequent charges of "cheating" were indulged in by the losers, and Jacobs was appealed to to decide the points in issue, which he always did favorably for the large "stranger." But as the losses grew heavier, the suffering parties became incensed, and charged Jacobs as coöperator with the large "stranger" and his partner; and finally some one on board declared that he knew Jacobs and the large "stranger" to be chums; that they travelled together up and down the river, swindling everybody they could "rope in" to play. This, being whispered about at first, became finally talked aloud; and then commenced fearful criminations and recriminations among the parties. Pistols and knives were freely brandished, and a grand melee seemed on the point of breaking out; and it did break at last, fearfully. All the while my eye was upon Jacobs. I could not, for some reason, avert it. Somehow he seemed to me to wonderfully resemble the description I had had of Legate; but there was this difficulty in the way of my suspicions. Jacobs wore upon the little finger of his left hand a large seal-ring, and there was unmistakably a full-formed finger, which articulated at the joints properly, and I must be mistaken. During the earlier part of the disturbance, which the officers of the boat tried in vain to quell, the big "stranger" had been the chief centre of abuse and attack; but suddenly some one exclaimed, "That black-muzzled wretch is worse than the big one," and the whole party of sufferers turned instantly upon him. Jacobs was a brave fellow, and with cocked revolver in hand breasted the whole, and swore he would kill the first man who laid hands on him, standing then on one side of the cabin with his back to the door of a state-room. Suddenly a passenger, who had retired for the night, opened the door behind him, and Jacobs, being stiffly braced against it, "lurched" for an instant, when an agile, wiry fellow of the angry crowd suddenly jumped forward and grasped his revolver, turning its muzzle upwards, when off went the pistol--the first shot, which was a signal for a desperate conflict, in which Jacobs struggled hard for the possession of his revolver, but was overpowered, and most severely beaten, so much so, that he had finally to be carried to his berth; and I followed the crowd that bore him there. He was speechless and nearly dead, I thought, and they laid him in his bunk. I noticed that the ring had gone from his finger, and with it, lo! the end of the finger also, leaving only the first joint and part of the second. I examined the stump, and saw that it was old. No further doubt rested on my mind that Jacobs and Legate were one and the same, and I immediately called the attention of the passengers to the loss of the ring and the finger, and caused search to be made for the same, which we found evidently unharmed, having somehow fallen into the state-room, the opening of the door of which first threw Jacobs off from his balance. I took charge of the finger, which was made of hardened wax, as my trophy, and some one, I knew not who, took the ring.

The big "stranger," who was badly bruised too, was not so much wounded that he could not be about next day, but kept aloof from poor Jacobs, probably because he had protested utter unacquaintance with him, and the next night, with the third "stranger," got off the boat, it was supposed, at the point where the boat stopped to wood, for the next day they were nowhere to be found on the boat; but poor Jacobs was so severely handled that his life was despaired of by a doctor on board, and we took him along to New Orleans. Meanwhile I had made my suspicions and business known to the captain of the boat, and we took means for Jacobs' detention on board after the rest of the passengers should leave. But, poor fellow! there was hardly need in his case for so much caution or prevision, for when we arrived in the city, Jacobs could not have left the boat had he tried, so weak and sick was he. I left him on board, and hastened to the office of a friend of mine, once a detective in New York, and told him the story, asking his counsel how best to proceed.

"Why," said he, "this is a strange affair; but I think I can put you in the way at once of identifying this Jacobs as the very Legate whom you are after. Indeed, rest assured that he _is_ your man, without doubt." Going to his drawer, he produced and showed to me an advertisement of a year before, offering a reward of two thousand dollars for the arrest of one "Charles Legate, alias Charles L. Montford," giving a description of his person, but pointing especially to the fact that he was wanting a portion of the little finger of the left hand. "You see," said my friend, "that _we_ have an interest in the fellow as well as you. If he is our man, we are all 'hunky-dory,'" said he, "for he is very rich, as we have found out--know where his money is."

"Rich?" asked I. "Why, then, does he continue to lead the life he does?"

"Why? Why, indeed, such a question from an old detective like you astonishes me: it wouldn't, though, if a woman, or a fool, asked it," said he, giving me a curious wink. "Don't you know yet that the Mississippi is infested with old gamblers rich as Jews, and who can't give up their pious trade to save their lives? Come along." And he took me down St. Louis Street a ways, and stepped into a side street, and standing before a door a moment, said, "Give me the finger, and follow me." We mounted a couple of flights of dirty stairs, and my friend opened a door into a sort of anatomical museum of old gypsum and wax casts, and all sorts of small sculptural devices.

"Mr. Cancemi at home?" asked my friend of a weird-looking lad, whose hands were besmeared with the plaster he was working. "Si signore," (yes, sir), was the reply; "but my fader is much sick, questo giorno" (to-day).

"But I must see him a moment. Won't you go ask him to come down?"

The family, it seemed, occupied rooms in the loft above. The boy hurried off, and presently the father came down with him, almost too feeble to walk.

"Cancemi," said my friend, "you are sick; but I've brought you some medicine that will cheer you up at once."

"Ah, Dio," exclaimed the old Italian, "I vish it be so. I am much ammalato (sick). What have you brought?--Tell quick."

"See here!" said my friend; "did you ever see that before?" producing the finger. The old Italian seemed a new man as his eyes dilated at the sight with wonder, and he went into raptures over the matter, the reason for which I could not understand, and in his broken English muttered a thousand exclamations of surprise and joy. Of course he identified the finger as the one he had made for the "villain-scoundrel Legate." Legate, I found, had never paid the Italian for his skillful handiwork, and he had been promised a portion of the reward, if my friend should succeed in earning it--hence his joy.

We left the old Italian soon, and proceeded to the boat, where we confronted Jacobs, and made him acknowledge his identity with Legate. My business was made known to him. He lay on the boat for two days, until her return trip, when we had him carefully taken to a private hospital, where he could, beyond possibility of escape, be confined, and awaited his slow recovery under the best medical and other attendance we could procure. I telegraphed to my parties in New York, one of whom came on directly, reaching New Orleans within ten days from that time; and before two weeks had passed from the time of his arrival, we had settled matters with the now penitent, because caged, Legate; and the New Orleans parties who had offered the reward were now called in by my detective friend, and settled their affairs with him by accepting a mortgage he held for twenty-five thousand dollars on a sugar plantation in the Opelousas country, paying the reward to my friend, and losing nothing in the result.

Only for the advertisement in the New Orleans paper, probably Legate would never have thought to procure a false finger; but for which I should never have been able to satisfy myself that Jacobs, in his bruised and battered state, was the identical Legate, and might have left him without further investigation on the boat.

The old Italian recovered his health speedily in his joy over Legate's capture, and was not forgotten by my friend, who, by the way, but for this old artist, would of course have never known of Legate's attempt at disguising the only peculiar mark about him, and would not, therefore, have been so sure of his identity when I told him my story. "Straws show which way the wind blows," and "fingers," though they be inanimate and waxen, may "point," you see, unmistakably to a villain.

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LOTTERY TICKET, No. 1710.

--------------

A DIGNIFIED REAL-ESTATE HOLDER, VERY WEALTHY, LOSES SEVEN
THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY-FIVE DOLLARS--OUR FIRST COUNCIL
AT THE HOWARD HOUSE--VISIT TO HIS HOUSE TO EXAMINE HIS SAFE AND
SERVANTS--A LOTTERY TICKET, NO. 1710, FOUND IN THE SAFE--HOW
CAME THIS MYSTERIOUS PAPER THERE?--CONCLUSIONS THEREON--VISIT
TO BALTIMORE, AND PLANS LAID IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE LOTTERY
AGENT TO CATCH THE THIEF--THE TICKET "DRAWS"--THE NEW YORK
AGENCY "MANAGED"--TRAP TO IDENTIFY THE THIEF--THE SECURITY AND
"SOLITUDE" OF A GREAT CITY--A NEW YORK BANKER--MR. LATIMER
VISITS A GAMBLING-HOUSE IN DISGUISE.--IDENTIFIES THE SUSPECTED
YOUNG MAN--THE AGENT AT BALTIMORE WAXES GLEEFUL--HIS PLAN OF
OPERATIONS OVERRULED--MEETING OF "INTERESTED PARTIES" AT THE
OFFICE IN BALTIMORE--A LITTLE GAME PLAYED UPON THE NEW YORK
AGENT--MR. WORDEN, THE THIEF, IDENTIFIES THE TICKET, AND FALLS
INTO THE TRAP OF A PRE-ARRANGED "DRAFT"--DISCLOSES SOME OF THE
IDENTICAL MONEY STOLEN--WE ARREST HIM--EXCITING SCRAMBLE--THE
MONEY RECOVERED--WORDEN'S AFTER LIFE.

"Your name is ----, I believe, sir?" asked a tall, gray-haired gentleman of me one evening, as I was stepping out of the Carleton House, a hotel then on the corner of Broadway and Leonard Street.

"Yes, that's my name," offering my hand to receive the already extended hand of the gentleman.

"I have sought you," said he, "at the suggestion of my friend and lawyer, James T. Brady; who tells me that you are able, if anybody is, to help me in my loss."

"You've had a loss? Well, sir, you wish to tell me about it. Shall we go in here, or where shall we go to talk it over."

"Can we not walk up Broadway, and I tell you during our walk?"

"Probably that would not be the best way," I replied, "for it is doubtless as a detective that you need me, and we might meet somebody who knows me as such, and who might be the very last person whom I should like to have see us together," I replied.

"You are right, sir," said he, smiling. "Your caution shows me that you understand your business; but it is too late to go far up town to my house.--I have it. I'll call at the Howard House, take a private room, and you follow, in half an hour, say, and finding this name on the register with my room, come up. Here's my card. Come directly to the room, and say nothing."

"That's a good plan, sir. I will be there;" and he left, and I, having finished my business at the Carleton, wandered slowly up Broadway to kill time, wondering what such a stately, dignified, cool-headed sort of a looking man as he--a real estate holder to large amount, a man whom everybody knew by reputation as one of the most quiet in the city--could have for me to do. I suspected forgery, arson, or some attempt at it, and a dozen other things. But I drove them all out of mind in a few minutes, for it is never well for a detective to indulge in anticipations in such a juncture of affairs; and meeting just then an old friend, beguiled a few minutes with him along Broadway, and finally taking out my watch, saw I had only ample time to get to the Howard at the time appointed, and so "suddenly recollected" an appointment, excused myself to my friend, sought the Howard and the gentleman there, whom I readily found in waiting for me.

"You are here on the moment," said he, as he closed and locked the door on my entry. "Take this seat, if you please, and I'll try to be short with my story."

"Go on, sir," said I; "but please don't be in too much haste. I have plenty of time; but tell me all your story as you would, and probably did, to Mr. Brady."

"Well, sir, day before yesterday morning I missed from my safe, at my house, seven thousand two hundred and fifty-five dollars, which I placed there the night before, having received most of it that day, at an hour too late to make deposit of it in bank;" and here he paused.

"Well, sir," said I, "who took it? That's the question, I presume, which you wish to solve."

"Yes, that, of course, is the point; but I can't fix my suspicions upon anybody."

"You say that most of this money was received after banking hours. Suppose you tell me next where and of whom you received it, and in what amounts, for I infer that you did not receive it in a lump."

"No; I collected it partly from rentals due, and some came to me from the country,--notes due,--and some from the sale of a cargo of pressed hay over at Jersey City, and I did not get around in time to put it in bank, such as I had, before closing hours," looking at memoranda.

"Well, I am glad you have memoranda of the amounts. Now tell me where you received these, each one;" and he went on to tell me, in detail, where, and who was near by, if anybody, in each case where a tenant or other debtor paid him money. I listened intently, and could get at nothing worthy of note till he came to the hay transaction at Jersey City. It appeared that there were several persons standing about at the time of the payment of the money to my client (call him Latimer, for further convenience), mostly working-men, some dealers, loafers, and two or three well-dressed, but rather dashily-dressed, young men. Mr. Latimer had been obliged to take out considerable money from his own purse, in order the better to arrange it to put in the amount then received; and feeling that he had quite an amount of money, even at that time, and he added some before he reached home, put his purse in his inner vest pocket, thinking of nothing worse than possibly encountering pickpockets, or losing his money by accident on the way. In his vest pocket he thought it secure, and secure it was to take home, but not secure for keeping.

The result of our conference was that evening, that I should be obliged to go with Mr. Latimer to his home the next morning, when he would call at my office for me. I could not go that night, and perhaps it was as well; for I had a business appointment which led me, not an hour after parting with Mr. Latimer, into certain haunts where I fancied,--it was mere imagination, if it were not instinctive perception, in which I do not much believe, although many mysterious things have occurred in my life which seemed to be governed or directed by some subtle law, which the human brain is not yet strong enough to discover,--where I fancied, I say, that I saw some of the money which Mr. Latimer had lost, displayed, and distributed in dissipation. In short, I imagined that I had stumbled upon the thief, and had I known the character of the bills, which Mr. Latimer, however, could not tell me much about, I might have seized my man then and there.

But the next morning I visited Mr. Latimer's house in an up-town street, which was not then, as now, compactly builded; at least, in the portion of it where he dwelt. I examined everything about the premises, concluded where a thief might have gotten into the house without much trouble, and finally commenced questioning Mr. Latimer about his family, the servants, etc. None of Mr. L.'s family, except his wife, were at home. Two boys, or young men, were at school, rather at college one of them, and both far away, and the daughters were at the female seminary in Cazenovia. As to the servants, in whose honesty Mr. Latimer had the utmost confidence, I had them called into my presence, and questioned them about the condition of the house on the night of the robbery. One of them heard some slight noise, at some time between twelve o'clock and four in the morning; was not definite. The others slept soundly; heard nothing. They did not seem to me likely to be connected with anybody, or to have lovers who would be apt to be of the class who might have robbed the safe. Besides, nobody, not even Mrs. Latimer, knew that Mr. L. had deposited any amount of money in his safe that night. He was of the order of men who attend strictly to "their own business," too strictly, sometimes, when evidence is wanted especially. His bedroom adjoined the room in which the safe stood, and was so situated in regard to a pair of "back stairs," that if the robber had come in from the back (on the theory of his possible complicity with the servants), he could have hardly gotten into the room without disturbing Mr. and Mrs. Latimer, unless on that night, which was probably the case, they slept with unusual soundness. I concluded that the robber must be an expert one, and somehow I constantly referred in mind to the fellow whom I have alluded to before as having been seen liberally dispensing money. He seemed to me competent for the business; but there was one thing which I left to the last, which arose in my mind at first on my interview with Mr. Latimer at the Howard; but I said nothing of it then, for I had learned that the best way is to approach the most serious troubles softly; as often the "course of things," as they take shape in an interview, will better point out how this or that mystery occurred than all the attempted solutions which one might, _a priori_, project for a week, and that one thing which perplexed me was, How did the robber unlock that safe? He must either have been familiar with the house and the safe, and perhaps had a key to it, or he must have carried about him, probably, several safe keys, one of which happened to fit (and the key to this safe was a small one, fifty of the like size of which would not much trouble a burglar to carry), or he must have gotten possession of Mr. Latimer's key. But his key was in his vest pocket, and his clothes were on a chair at the head of his bed, he said, on my inquiring,--there's where he left them, and there was where he found them in the morning,--and he was sure he locked his safe securely after putting the money in. I finally, as the concluding portion of my examination, asked Mr. Latimer to let me see the inside of his safe, and to show me where he deposited the money. He unlocked and opened the safe,--a simple lock concern, proof really against nothing but fire, perhaps; for although it was supposed that the keyhole was so small, and the safe so constructed, that burglars could not get sufficient powder into it to blow it up, yet it would not have stood a minute against the skill and power of professional burglars; but to open it, as they would have done, would have necessitated noise enough to have awakened Mr. Latimer, especially as the bedroom door was open. Mr. Latimer had put the money into a little drawer in the safe, and turned the key of that, which key, however, remained in the drawer lock. But the drawer was tight, and we tried a dozen times to pull it out without making a creaking noise, without avail; so I concluded that, on the whole, Mr. Latimer and his wife _had_ slept that night pretty soundly.

We were about closing the safe again,--I having made due examination, and asked all necessary questions,--when Mr. Latimer, thinking to arrange a half dozen or so papers which had been thrown loosely upon the bottom of the safe, took them up in one grasp of the hand, and commenced to put them in file, when out of his hand dropped a little white card with figures on it, which arrested his attention. He picked it up, looked at it with astonishment, and said, "That's a curious thing to be here," handing it to me. "You will perhaps think me a sporting man, a devotee of the Goddess of Luck; but I don't know who put that here." "Who has access to your safe besides yourself?" "My wife; she has a key." "O," said I, "perhaps she's put it here then." "Not she," said he. "She'd turn pale with horror if she had found that here, in fear that I might be trifling with lotteries. A brother of hers spent a good-sized fortune in lottery tickets, and died of disappointment and chagrin over his course. Not she!" "Yes, I know," said I; "still she may have put it there, if not for herself, for one of the servants, perhaps; for you know many servants have a mania for 'trying their luck.'" So Mrs. Latimer was called, and asked about the lottery ticket. There was no mistaking her seriousness when she said that if one of the servants had asked her to lock up the ticket for safety, she would have taken it and torn it to pieces before her eyes. I was satisfied. But how came the ticket there. "No. 1710, Great Havana Consolidated Lottery," to be drawn on such a day, through the house of Henry Colton & Co., Baltimore. This is as near as the notes of my diary of those days, much worn, permit me to recount the words and figures of the ticket as I took them down in pencil. I studied the ticket, and saw from a note at the bottom that some days would elapse before the drawing was to come off. It was a fresh ticket then, evidently. But how did it get there? Mr. and Mrs. Latimer knew nothing about it--that was clear. It had not been there long--that was equally clear. I questioned Mr. Latimer about the condition of the loose papers in the bottom of the safe. It appeared he did not observe much order in them, so I could learn nothing by that query. Finally, I concluded that perhaps in pulling out the drawer the robber experienced considerable trouble, and that if he had the ticket in his vest pocket at the time, in bending over, and exerting some force to pull out the drawer, he might have dropped it on the floor, and perhaps his curiosity led him to pull out the papers too, some of which fell from his hand, and he picked them up, the ticket along with them. I settled upon this, and there was a clew to the robber, if nothing more. But how did he unlock the safe? This question remained unanswered. Perhaps with a false key, as I have before suggested; but this lock was one supposed to need a special key, none other exactly like it in the whole world. After we had finished our examination, Mr. Latimer closed the safe door, gave a turn to the knob, and jerked out the key. I do not know what led me to think of it, but I asked, "Have you locked it?" "Yes," said he, "that's all you have to do to lock one of these safes," at the same time taking hold of the knob, and pulling it, to show me how securely and simply it was fastened; when, lo, open came the door! Mr. Latimer was confounded, and I confess I was greatly surprised. It might have been that the robber that night found as easy access to the drawer as Mr. Latimer then. We examined the working of the lock as well as we could, and found that something must be deranged, for although it would, on turning the knob, give a "thud," as if the bolts were driven home, it did not always put them in place. Mr. Latimer had his safe repaired after that, and found some "slide" in the lock-work a little out of place.

But I had gotten the ticket, and I told Mr. Latimer that we must work out the problem with that, or fail; and I sent Mr. Latimer about to his debtors, who had paid him the stolen money, to see if any of them could remember the denominations of the bills, and by what banks issued, which they had given him. He found something in his search which seemed likely to serve me. I gave Mr. Latimer my theory of the case, and pointed out to him the course I should pursue, and we concluded that a week would probably bring us to the determination to try longer, or would put us on the clear track of the robber or robbers, for there might have been more than one. Mr. Latimer authorized me, in case I saw fit, to offer a reward of five hundred or a thousand dollars for the robbers, or double these sums for the robbers and the money.

My first step was to go to Baltimore, where I learned that the ticket was genuine, but I could not learn the name of the person to whom it was issued. I had obtained it, I represented, of a man who never bought tickets, and was curious to know of whom he got it: but it was of no use to inquire. They kept faith with their customers. I could have inquired, with perhaps more success, of the agent in New York, but I dared not venture to see him. Some special friend of his might have bought that number,--"1710,"--and he would tell him of the inquiry, and the robber might suspect that he had lost it on Mr. Latimer's premises. The New York agent had fortunately made his report to the "general office" in Baltimore a day or two before. I left the lottery office, baffled for a moment, but I soon laid a plan. If this ticket wins,--and I shall know by the drawn numbers as published in the papers immediately after the drawing,--then I will "lay in" with the ticket agent, with the bribe or "reward" of five hundred or a thousand dollars, to help me detect the robber; and if the ticket fails to win, I will make the ticket agent my confidant, and have him despatch a note to the person to whom this ticket was sold, saying that "1710" has drawn a prize, to be paid on presentation of the ticket; and in this way get the man into my clutches. So thinking to myself, I concluded to stop in Baltimore till after the drawing, which occurred three days from that time.