SIR R. ANDERSON’S LATEST STORY

Evening Star, Issue 14420, 16 July 1910, Page 6

SIR R. ANDERSON’S LATEST STORY

In the now number of ‘Blackwood’s Magazine' Sir Robert Anderson continues hia interesting papers on ‘The lighter Sid© of My Official Life,’ which attracted so much attention owing to the revelations as to his association with the 1 Pamellisn and Crime ’ articles. Sir Robert tells a number of admirable Scotland Yard stories. ( One is a remarkable illustration of a. woman’s daring and skill. A street quarrel between two young men . one night in February, 1896, attracted the attention of the police constable on the i boat, and when they separated on© of | them, whose action excited his suspicions, ' was brought to the station. There the delinquent’was found to be a young woman in man’s dross, and when she appeared before a magistrate next morning hex story, which he heard in his private room, was so interesting and pathetic that, in discharging her, he directed that her case thould bo specially reported to me. It transpired moreover, that she had received sympathy and pecuniary help from people in, a. very exalted position ip London. Accordingly I sent for her. When she cam© to mv office she was dressed neatly and * with taste, in female garln of course. She was attractive and ladylike, and rather pretty; her voice was pleasing,_ and her smile was charming. She eat facing me at the opposite side "of my table for nearly an hour, talking over her wonderful life store. By temperament and training lam a hopeless sceptic, but neither by word nor gesture did I betray my doubt© about her narrative. Again and again I brought her round to various points in her story, and quietly cross-examined her upon them. But her ‘statements never varied; she • never prevaricated, and a guileless child could not have answered me more promptly and simply. —A Plausible Story.— The circumstances of her early life, she : so id, were long a mystery to hex. Ibough i []].;, woman she supposed to be her mother was only a. housekeeper, she was sent to a good school, arid had occasional trips to the Continent. It was not till recent years that she discovered her real parentage. Her mother was a lady, and her father was the Lord Justice A. L. SmithPeople of high degree who knew her story had been kind to her, and she had received valuable presents from them, notably some old furniture and a few valuable paintings. Amonu the people she named, who were personally known to mo, she had much to ky about Lord and Lady Rosebery, and she was verv pathetic about the mingled kindness and' neglect with which her fuller the Lord Justice had treated her. The only item in her narrative which was eapalll© of immediate verification I found to he true —namely, her possession of the old furniture and the paintings. But i still I was sceptical.

—Fiction from First to Last,—

I knew that my friend, Mr J. L. Wharton, then M.P. for Durham, was on terms of brotherly intimacy with “A.L.” (as ha always called him)so to him I applied. He scorned the story; and next day they called on me together. “ I hear yon have found a new daughter for me,” was the Lord Justice’s cheery greeting; “T hope she’s pretty.” I told him she was both pretty and charming. That, he declared, was clear evidence that she was his child; and yet there was not a word of truth in her statements. I then pursued my inquiries, and I found that her story was fiction from first to last. Her father kept a bric-a-hrac shop, and, as she lived near by, ho used her as a temporary receptacle for some of his wares, including the valuable pictures. Her schooling was such as Mr W. E. Forster’s Education Act had provided, and her trips abroad were flights of fancy. Scores of times I have seen a truthful witness break down under the sort of cross-examination which this girl Iwrc without wincing, and with- > cut making a single e-lip. 1 have had experience of similar cases, but this was incomparably the most interesting and ex Iraordinary I have ever known.