Knots Untied; Or, Ways and By-ways in the Hidden Life of American Detectives

by George S. McWatters

I tried to laugh the old man out of his notion, but he said it was of no use, that he knew Mr. —— only too well. I have ever since observed a greater care in my general descriptions, and never forget that distance of space or time may be no surety of secrecy.

In the town of ——, in the State of New York, for fifty years before the time I was called to take part in the affair which is the chief part of the subject-matter of this, there had lived a quaint old man of wealth, whom his neighbors but little understood. He had had, in the course of his life, three wives, two of whom had borne him children, none of which lived but a few years, and the third had died childless. But the old man, in his grief over the want of "natural heirs of his own body," had adopted several children, one after the other, whenever he lost one of his, "to keep the number good," as he said. The old gentleman, whom we will call James Alvord, was born in Vermont, reared in the strictest Puritan ways, and was bred to work. At about sixteen years of age, I believe, he was apprenticed to learn the harness-maker's trade, from which time he left off going to school; but he was of studious disposition, and I was told (for I never saw him myself) that he had aggregated to himself a large amount of information upon almost all subjects, and that had he been an aspirant for public honors and distinctions, his fund of knowledge would have enabled him to cope successfully with almost any man in the State. But he had no vain aspirations. To accumulate knowledge and money was his chief desire, not to make display with either, but simply to enjoy the consciousness of having,—possessing, it would seem.

The old man had not far wandered from the moral notions and feelings which were inculcated or aroused in him by his Vermont education, but he entertained some peculiar notions of his own. In fact, he was all his own—all character, all strong individuality in everything.

Among his notions—perhaps I should call them his fixed opinions—was, that it was every married couples' duty, if possible, to bring into the world six children, and if they could not have them themselves, to adopt as many from families that had more; for in his early days, when he first imbibed this notion, it was no rare thing for families in Vermont to count around the hearthstone ten and twelve children apiece. Six is the product of two multiplied by three. Three, of course, comprehends a "trinity," and upon the mystic trinity, so frequently discovered in Nature, the old man built many theories. Three was a mystic number with him.

"There are but three primitive colors," he used to say. "All other colors are the results of the intermixture of two or all of these," and so on, the old gentleman was accustomed to elucidate his "philosophy;" and somehow he had so applied the mystic three to the matter of parentage, that he had arrived at the doctrine noticed above, and he was a man who most strictly observed himself what he was pleased to teach others as a duty; and so, from time to time, in the lack of children who continued to live, he adopted others. He did not seem, however, in his "adoptions" to have observed much "philosophy" (the word that was most often upon his tongue, and which, in fact, did signify not a little of the character it intimates, in his brain) in selecting the children.

He overlooked the matter of stock and blood, and seemed only anxious to make sure of healthy children; which is not so much to be wondered at in his case, perhaps. So that when these six grew up to maturity they developed characters about as diverse as could possibly be found, notwithstanding the course of their education, or rather teachings (mental and moral) had been about the same.

Some of them gave the old man much uneasiness; and notwithstanding that he had placed each in business when he had arrived at age, or had given the girls each of them a good outfit on her marriage, yet some of them were discontented, and thought the old man ought to have the grace to die in good season, in order that they might obtain their expected shares of property; for it was presumed by them that Mr. Alvord would treat them all alike, and leave no will in fact. I should not forget to say here, that there were of these children three males and three females. Mr. Alvord had first adopted a boy, next a girl, and so on, alternating.

Time went on, and the three boys had grown to manhood, and married, and two of the girls had filled out into mature womanhood in good time, and had married. Mr. Alvord, as I have said before, had been generous to them all, and impartial in the bestowal of his pecuniary favors; but it would have been impossible, under the circumstances, to have been equally respectful of them all in his heart, so diverse were they in character. The oldest boy grew up to be a very respectful, but sluggish and somewhat stupid man.

The second one became a tricky, crafty fellow, full of cunning wiles, and was what the world calls a "smart man"—ignorant of everything but business, and more willing to succeed at that through scheming and dishonorable practices (safely dishonorable, I mean, for he was too "smart" to do anything in which he was likely to be trapped; but dishonorable, still, in the strict interpretation of that word; only dishonorable so far as the laws of business would allow him to be—which is latitude enough for most wickedly-inclined men). He left the farm, for which Mr. Alvord tried to induce him to cultivate a love, and had gone into merchandizing on a moderate scale, a year or two after his marriage, and it was said at once of him that he could drive "as sharp a bargain as the best of them;" a phrase in which "worst" is substituted for "best" in the experienced hearer's mind.

His name was a peculiar one—"Floramond;" a name which his mother had selected from an old novel, which she read while bearing him, and which she made Mr. Alvord agree to not change when he adopted him. "Flor" was his nickname, which he always bore in manhood as well as in childhood, and it became a name in his neighborhood at last, which was a synonym of craft and business meanness. "That's Flor all over," was said when anybody, no matter who, was found guilty of some extortion, or cheating, or grasping meanness.