TRACKED DOWN.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 12255, 4 June 1914, Page 8

TRACKED DOWN.

AN HOUR WITH ■• THE .-.BLOODHOUNDS OF SCTLAND-YABD.

I'k-ft my house that mornhig.charged bv. Mr wffe with a commission to iecfaim* from the Lost.Property Office a hag-purse which .she had loft, in' an omnibus a lew days previously. I was not at all happy about it. .. . _ To me there is' something mysterious and awful about Scotland-yard. "The officials at Scotland-yard are reticent, but their plans are. believed to l)e complete, and »n ;irrest may be hourly expected." That, is how 1 think <i( .Scotland-yard. I was in some degree reassured upon finding that the Lost Property Office has 4i separate entrance from the Embankment;. ..but, even so, it is con-t-iolkxl by the police force, ami has obvious! communication with, the main building.. I walked bodily in, and found myself in the presence of two officers. One stood facing me at the counter, and.the other, probably, of tire Criminal Investigation Department;! was sitting at a. table in the background, examining some documents with the most earnest attention. An "old friend of mine, who in this country had formed the habit of being unjustly suspected by the police, but is now'leading an easier life in New Zealand, once laid down a golden rule for my benefit. It was .this: In the presence of a policeman speak always the truth, and nothing but the truth, but do not speak until you are spoken to.'

Carefully retaining my gloves on my hands, to avoid leaving any fingerprints, about, I advanced to the counter, and waited. After a long silence, the officer opened his lip's; the dreaded cross-examination was about to begin.

"Have vou lost a stick or an umbrella?"

Well, it was a long time ago now, but I was not going to sav "Sq." : ia be asked, criishingly, what I was'doing on the afternoon of September 4, 190 S. So I said "Yes," quite simply, and waited for the next question.

The criminal investigator in the background was biting his lip. He was, I suppose, hot on the track of some unfortunate victim. The officer at the counter smiled inscrutably. As he appeared to have completed his' inquiries, I added, in a burst of confidence:— : "I found it again the next day. As a matter, of fact, it was in the um-brella-stand all the time!"

The criminal investigator burst into a loud laugh, which he instantly smothered with his hand. Evidently be had laid the murderer by the heels, but feared to disclose the fact in the presence of the. public. The officer at the counter looked, more like "Monna Lisa''; than ever. At last be said, not unkindly:—

. "Why have you oome here?" "Because my wife asked me to," I retorted bitterly. "If it had been my own purse I would have let, the omnibus conductor keep it for himself. You surely don't "

"Purses will be among the miscellaneous, sir. Next entrance. This is only sticks and umbrellas." Assisted by a keen north wind;- which blew along the Embankment, I p'nlled/i myself together and tried the other door.-: When once I am really roused, T lose all sense of fear. This time I. determined to get the whip hand at the start and retain it throughout. Really, they were not policemen at all in the ordinary sense of the word.

I walked straight up to the• counter,, and began to speak in a commanding .voice:—

"The other morning, as we- sat at breakfast, my.wife said to me, 'I simply milst go up to town to-day to get myself some new ' No, don't interrupt, please, we arc not in court now, and 1 am going to tell my story in ray own way—as T was saying, she said to me, 'if I don't'—and, by Jove! there, it is. on that shelf over there. What luck!"

Gradually breaking through the. autosphere of suspicion in which I seemed to be enveloped, T succeeded in satis-' fyi'ig the officer that it was indeed my wife's purse, and that I was authorised to receive it. But even then he would not hand it over to me.

He weighed it in his hand critically, and said', "About what value do you place on it?" .

Ho seemed to be laying himself open to a snub, but I spared him. I did not

at all object to a few niintit.es' chut. Poor fellow, his work must be very monotonous.

"Before 1 placed a value on it," I began, "T should want to -know why .you asked. There is, for instance, a silver card-case in that purse which was my birthday present to my wife. To her it is priceless, but to you . Again, in that card-case there are visiting cards', for the possession of which the best families in Ealing have fought for years. To you they would be waste paper."

He out me short by explaining that his inquiry was not frivolous. Before receiving the purse I had to pay a. sum equal to half a- crown for every pound of its value, to reward the conductor for picking it up from the floor of his omnibus. (My son shall he an omnibus conductor.)

We ngreed the value of the purse and its. contents at twenty-five "shillings, after which we proceeded to calculate, according to our several methods, the amount of the compensation.

I divided by six in my head, and waited. He took out a pencil and a sheet of paper, and made some extraordinary calculations, apparently treatinn- it as a harmonic series, and solving it by meansof the calculus. (There is another policeman, T am told, who paints pictures for the Royal Academy.)

"Three shillings and a penny halfpenny," lie announced. "Wrong!" I replied. Mine was the better way. but I ought, strictly speaking, to have diyided by eight. Having paid him the money and wished- him good-day, I made for home.

In reply to my wife's inquiry, T told her proudly that I had succeeded in identifying her purse, that I had paid the amount rtf the compensation, and that she had nothing to do but go up herself and receive her property, which, of course, thev would not hand over to any one but the owner.

Perhaps they will want to charge her again for. it. If they do I shall certainly take counsel's opinion. It is a nice legal point whether anything can be said ,to have been "lost" upon the premises of that department which is itself the depository "of lost property.