"That hour o' night's black arch the keystane!"
THE DETECTIVE'S TALE.
THE CHANCE QUESTION.
It is not long since the cleverest of these strangely constituted men called detectives [entre nous myself] went up to his superintendent with a very rueful face, and told him that all his energies were vain in discovering a clue to an extensive robbery of plate which had occurred in —— Street some short time before.
"I confess myself fairly baffled," he said; and could say no more.
"With that singular foxhound organ of yours?" replied his superior. "The herring must have been well smoked."
"At the devil's own fire of pitch and brimstone," said the detective. "But the worst is, I have had no trail to be taken off. I never was so disconcerted before. Generally some object to point direction, if even only a dead crow or smothered sheep; but here, not even that."
"No trace of P—— or any of the English gang?"
"None; all beyond the bounds, or up chimneys, or down in cellars, or covered up in coal-bunkers. I am beginning to think the job to be of home manufacture."