“Nothing could be fairer,” Tom Bob agreed, adding with characteristic phlegm: “At the same time, sir, if you wish here and now to have the two missing tickets, all you have to do is to search that young gentleman’s pockets, I have no doubt they are in his possession.”
“I prefer to do nothing,” insisted the official, shaking his head in a puzzled way, “I shall do nothing, you will explain yourselves, as I said before, to the Constabulary Office at Saint-Lazare.”
A quarter of an hour later, still in a state of breathless excitement, the first class passengers of the Trans-Atlantic express arrived at their journey’s end. Instead of leaving the station, they all waited in silence on the platform where the train had pulled up, formed up in two lines, between which marched Tom Bob and his captive. They had been the last to leave the train, but not unaccompanied; four police-officers, to whom the Superintendent had beckoned as the train ran in, escorted the pair, equally determined that neither one nor the other, detective or culprit, should escape.
Who was right and who was wrong? This was what nobody knew. However, a few minutes later, before the Special Commissary, light began to dawn. The individual whom Tom Bob had accused of theft was searched. On him was found Ascott’s pocket book, Mrs. Bigelow’s reticule—and a leather purse, absolutely empty!
“Where have you put the money that was in this purse?” asked the Commissary sternly.
But Tom Bob burst out laughing: “That purse was empty to begin with, sir,” he declared, “I can assure you of that much, for it is my own. It’s what I call my decoy-purse. When I’m bent on looking after matters in a crowd, I put it well in sight, hanging out of my vest pocket, and wait events. The expected result never fails to arrive, the pickpockets take me for a fool, make a dead set at me and rob me with the more ease inasmuch as I help them all I can. It doesn’t bring them in a lot, for I can’t afford to be generous with them, but it has this great advantage, it enables me to make the gentleman’s acquaintance. That, Mr. Commissary, is how we do things in America, or at any rate how Tom Bob, the American detective, does ’em!”
The Special Commissary looked at the American in bewilderment, not unmixed with a touch of jealousy. It could not be denied the man was very clever and he had just done a pretty stroke of business, in which unfortunately the French police could find little to boast about. Still the Commissary thanked the detective, and added:
“We shall perhaps require you to give evidence, sir; where shall I be able to find you?”
Tom Bob pencilled a few words on his card, saying at the same time: “I have engaged rooms at the Hôtel Terminus; the police will always find me there at their disposal.”
A minute or two more and Ascott recovered possession of his pocket-book, and Mrs. Bigelow’s reticule returned to its lawful owner. The Americans were one and all delighted, and wished that very evening to celebrate their fellow-countryman’s splendid triumph; Tom Bob, however, asked modestly to be excused, declaring he was tired out, and quickly disappeared in the crowd.