"I hope you may be successful—I sincerely hope so," I told him, as we shook hands at parting.
Mat Morris went his road and I went mine, and in the busy details of my life soon forgot him.
One afternoon, a lot of us detectives were grouped together, discussing an offer of a reward of one thousand dollars for the discovery of some stolen bonds and the person who had made free with them.
The known facts of the case were in our possession, and when I sat in my room that evening, recalling them one by one, it struck me that a certain criminal might have had a hand in the affair, for the method of making the robbery was in his style.
Singular as it may seem, nearly every professional thief has a method of working up his "jobs," and a detective very frequently can positively say: "Such and such a person had a hand in that affair," merely because they know the style and method of the work.
I put on my coat and hat and went out, my footsteps turned in the direction of this person's haunts.
As I drew near to a saloon which he was accustomed to frequent, I caught sight of the very individual, and followed him.
He passed the saloon, and going on, turned the next corner.
I hastened forward, was about to turn the corner, when a slight thing brought me suddenly to a halt.
It was nothing more nor less than a simple shadow, cast on the walk by a gaslight. It was the shadow of a slender figure, in male attire, a cap on the head, one hand raised, while the index finger was being shaken after somebody in the distance.