Wood River times. [volume] (Hailey, Idaho) 1882-1915, 1893-09-22
AN AMERICAN IN IT.
The Great Hatton Garden Swindle, Writ
ten for This Paper.
BY j. M. BARRIE.

full five feet-three boundary Of i'm
pressivenesS, as he said to his wife,
who had followed him.
Matilda Yane, if dey can come any
OF dere schwindling bricks over me, I
makes dem q breasant OF all dey lays
dere fingers on. De quickness Of de hand
VII never keep pace init de rapidity of
vay!"
And with these emphatic words, de-
livered with tap on the side of the
nose and sagacious wink of the eye,
Mr.. Cornelius Vanderstroom executed
dignifed waddle down the road in
the direction Of his train, while his
wife, turning round in the hall, when
her lord and master was out of sight,
discovered and Immediately took pos
session Of the dropped pocket-book.
CHAPTER II.
When the diamond merchant re-
turned from business to his suburban
home that night he was strangely
altered man. The starch and buckram
OF the mornings exit had vanished. A
limp, inyertebrate exterior, combined
with a detected havior Of the visage,"
CAAOAoAy 0VUOoVOA uA0uS 44h0 11d1AloU al
his affection, he had that within him
which passeth show"
Mrs. VanderstrOOm, however, seemed
oblivious of the change. They had no
company at dinner, so they sat down to
a tete-a-tete repast, at which the lady
had to do all the talking, for poor Van
derstroom had evidently returned to
the monOsyllabic period of primeval
speech. The music in the drawing
room was bereft of its customary
charms to Cornelius just as the last
cigar and might cap seemed destitute
Of fragrance and consolation. But, all
unmindful of such matters, his wife
alternately ratified on the piano and
chartered through the evening, until
the stable clock chimed half-past II,
and it was time to go to bed.
A married mans couch is the last
place in which he should attempt to
hide a secret sorrow. VanderstrOOm
knew instinctively that it was all up
with him the moment he slid between
the sheets. For breathes there a Bon
edict in bonnie England who would be
permitted to close his eyes and Danish
care by slumber without first impart-
ing the cause of his discomfort to his
wife? Although Mrs. Vanderstroom
knew we'll enough what was on her
husbands mind, it did not suit that
estimable lady's purpose to alleviate
his distress until she had proved to him
in a practical manner that he was far
from the careful custodian of his own
property he invariably represented
himself to be. Moreover, she liked, in
common with the rest of her sex, to
have any superfluous money there
might be about in her own safe keep
ing, and now such a chance as she had
never dreamed of in her widest dreams
presented itself. With it came the op-
pOrtunity to read her lord lesson, and
prove to him that he was not such a
cock-of-the-walk as he imagined, and
that henceforward, if there was any
growing to be done, it might just as
we'll be undertaken by the hen.
There was no sleep for Cornelius that
night until his bedroom had been
turned into a star chamber, with his
wife as grand inquisitor, and the bed
for the rack. Slowly, but surely, the
| dreadful confession was wrung from
him. Humbly he had to disclose the
nature of the loss he firmly believed
he had sustained-to abjectly own that
he had been robbed in broad daylight
in his train, perchance-he, the astute,
clever Cornelius, robbed like a common
containing G3,50O in Bank of England
from his undercoat somewhere between
his home and Hatton Garden; fol
when he reached his Office that morn
ing it was gone.
! Mrs. Vanderstroom listened in a kind
of ecstasy of female triumph to hel
husbands agonized confession of male
fallibility. Nor was it until she haG
extracted from him VOW that he
would never carry such large sums
about with him again, and that he
would deliver the CO, 500 into her safe
keeping-should it ever be recovered
which seemed hopeless, after all he
had told her at breakfast about limo
cent holders of stolen Bank of England
nOtes"-and never ask for the money
back again, unless the demands of bust
ness rendered such a course absolutely
imperative; it was only after these sol
emn promises had been drawn from the
unhappy Cornelius that his good lady
turned him in an instant from the mos
miserable of mortals to the most Joy
GUS of little men by showing him his
pocket-bOok with the notes intact, al
She had found them in the hall that
morning, reposing snugly and safely
under her pillow.
From that hour Mr.. Cornelius Van
derstroom's reputation for phenomena
cuteness in the detection Of crime, hi.
dissertations on rogues and roguery, a:
we'll as the customary illusions to his
distinctive dexterity in the detection O.
put up yobs, had to be confined to hi.
city circle of admirers. But events
were ripening destined to shatter the
diamond merchants reputation fol
sharpness as much abroad as at home
| CHAPTER III.
It was afternoon in Hatton Garden
| Cornelius was summing his c0nSennen