The Pursuit of the House-Boat | Page 6

understood that you are told in the strictest confidence, for, as I say, the
incident involves a state secret of great magnitude. In life--in the mortal
life--gentlemen, I was a detective by profession, and, if I do say it, who

perhaps should not, I was one of the most interesting for purely literary
purposes that has ever been known. I did not find it necessary to go
about saying 'Ha! ha!' as M. Le Coq was accustomed to do to advertise
his cleverness; neither did I disguise myself as a drum-major and hide
under a kitchen-table for the purpose of solving a mystery involving the
abduction of a parlor stove, after the manner of the talented Hawkshaw.
By mental concentration alone, without fireworks or orchestral
accompaniment of any sort whatsoever, did I go about my business,
and for that very reason many of my fellow-sleuths were forced to go
out of real detective work into that line of the business with which the
stage has familiarized the most of us--a line in which nothing but
stupidity, luck, and a yellow wig is required of him who pursues it."
"This man is an impostor," whispered Le Coq to Hawkshaw.
"I've known that all along by the mole on his left wrist," returned
Hawkshaw, contemptuously.
"I suspected it the minute I saw he was not disguised," returned Le Coq,
knowingly. "I have observed that the greatest villains latterly have
discarded disguises, as being too easily penetrated, and therefore of no
avail, and merely a useless expense."
"Silence!" cried Confucius, impatiently. "How can the gentleman
proceed, with all this conversation going on in the rear?"
Hawkshaw and Le Coq immediately subsided, and the stranger went
on.
"It was in this way that I treated the strange case of the lost tiara,"
resumed the stranger. "Mental concentration upon seemingly
insignificant details alone enabled me to bring about the desired results
in that instance. A brief outline of the case is as follows: It was late one
evening in the early spring of 1894. The London season was at its
height. Dances, fêtes of all kinds, opera, and the theatres were in full
blast, when all of a sudden society was paralyzed by a most audacious
robbery. A diamond tiara valued at £50,000 sterling had been stolen
from the Duchess of Brokedale, and under circumstances which threw

society itself and every individual in it under suspicion--even his Royal
Highness the Prince himself, for he had danced frequently with the
Duchess, and was known to be a great admirer of her tiara. It was at
half-past eleven o'clock at night that the news of the robbery first came
to my ears. I had been spending the evening alone in my library making
notes for a second volume of my memoirs, and, feeling somewhat
depressed, I was on the point of going out for my usual midnight walk
on Hampstead Heath, when one of my servants, hastily entering,
informed me of the robbery. I changed my mind in respect to my
midnight walk immediately upon receipt of the news, for I knew that
before one o'clock some one would call upon me at my lodgings with
reference to this robbery. It could not be otherwise. Any mystery of
such magnitude could no more be taken to another bureau than
elephants could fly--"
"They used to," said Adam. "I once had a whole aviary full of winged
elephants. They flew from flower to flower, and thrusting their
probabilities deep into--"
"Their what?" queried Johnson, with a frown.
"Probabilities--isn't that the word? Their trunks," said Adam.
"Probosces, I imagine you mean," suggested Johnson.
"Yes--that was it. Their probosces," said Adam. "They were great
honey-gatherers, those elephants--far better than the bees, because they
could make so much more of it in a given time."
Munchausen shook his head sadly. "I'm afraid I'm outclassed by these
antediluvians," he said.
"Gentlemen! gentlemen!" cried Sir Walter. "These interruptions are
inexcusable!"
"That's what I think," said the stranger, with some asperity. "I'm having
about as hard a time getting this story out as I would if it were a serial.
Of course, if you gentlemen do not wish to hear it, I can stop; but it

must be understood that when I do stop I stop finally, once and for all,
because the tale has not a sufficiency of dramatic climaxes to warrant
its prolongation over the usual magazine period of twelve months."
"Go on! go on!" cried some.
"Shut up!" cried others--addressing the interrupting members, of
course.
"As I was saying," resumed the stranger, "I felt confident that within an
hour, in some way or other, that case would be placed in my hands. It
would be mine either positively or negatively--that is to say, either the
person robbed would employ me to ferret out the