AN eminently respectable tradesman was seated in his cosy little parlour, or counting-house, at the back of his shop, within a mile of the Mansion House in the City of London, one summer afternoon in the year 1861. His wife was the only other person present on this occasion. It was an unusual circumstance for this lady to be there, as Mr. Delmar also occupied, for purposes of residence, a neat little house in an eastern suburb of the metropolis. He was, moreover, the father of a family. He had four sons and three daughters, whose ages varied between seven and twenty-two. He was churchwarden of the parish in which he carried on business. He was regarded as the very pattern of domestic virtue, and a model of rectitude in business. Few men, indeed, in the whole world enjoyed a better reputation than Mr. Delmar. Nobody had ever breathed a word against his character, and nobody had a right to do so. His fireside was as cheerful as moderate prosperity, a good wife, and dutiful children could render it.

These particulars about Mr. Delmar, his family, his connexions, his circumstances, and his reputation, are necessary to enable the reader to appreciate the incidents I have to describe.

Mrs. Delmar had come to town, on the present occasion, for the legitimate purpose of shopping. She was giving her prudent spouse an estimate of the call she needed—or considered that she needed—to make upon his purse for a variety of domestic necessities, from little child’s-shoes to her own and her eldest daughter’s bonnets. Mr. Delmar was checking off the anticipated outlay, or, as I may put it, revising the domestic estimates, with a prudence quite commendable and, I also think, consistent with a good husband and father’s affection for those dependent on him.

An assistant of Mr. Delmar’s entered the parlour, or counting-house, and observed, “A gentleman wishes to see you, sir, in the shop.”

“Show him in, Williams.”

“He says he wishes to see you privately, sir.”

“Privately!” exclaimed Mr. Delmar, in tones of surprise; “show him in;” and the speaker glanced at his better half as he finished the sentence.

Williams left the room and informed the gentleman, who was standing in the shop, that his master wished him to walk in.

“You told me,” observed the unknown visitor to the shopman, “that Mrs. Delmar was with her husband?”

“Yes, sir,” was the reply.

“I would rather Mr. Delmar should step out to me.”

“He will not do it, sir. He says you are to go in to him.”

“Well, I will see him.”

The unknown visitor advanced to the apartment in which the worthy and happy couple were closeted; he cautiously, not to say nervously, opened the door, and seemed to halt in the execution of his purpose.

“I would very much rather see you alone, sir, for a moment.”

“You cannot see me alone, sir; this lady is my wife.”

“My business is private.”

“I have no private business or secrets unknown to my wife, sir,” exclaimed Mr. Delmar, growing a little irritated.

“Well, sir, you will oblige me if you will step out a moment.”

“I tell you, sir, I have no secrets from my wife. What is your business?”

“You really, sir——“

“What do you mean, sir? I insist upon your telling me immediately what brings you here. And if you do not, I will kick you into the street.”

Mr. Delmar uttered these words in a tone which alarmed his visitor, who, perhaps, apprehended the fulfilment of the threat which his delicacy had elicited; but, summoning his courage, he advanced towards the desk and took from his pocket a paper, which he handed in silence to the astonished and indignant husband.

It was a summons to show cause why he should not maintain a female child which one Selina Wilkins, chambermaid at the Griffin’s Head Hotel (an excellent hostelry, well known to commercial travellers on the midland road who call at the town of ——), was the mother of.

Mr. Delmar was a man who had seen much of the world, although he had, happily for himself, not known many of its vicissitudes, or its wickednesses and perils. His knowledge and experience were, however, at fault on the present occasion. During two or three minutes of perfect silence, in which the three persons glanced at one another alternately, Mr. Delmar was a prey to conflicting emotions and cross purposes. At first he was disposed, without warning, to enforce the threat he had not long ago made, and punish the agent of the infamous practical joke now being practised at his expense, as he conceived it, by inflicting upon him an ignominious and severe chastisement. Next, he trembled before a vague apprehension that some foul conspiracy might have been devised for the ruin of his own and his family’s domestic peace. The inquiry passed through his mind. Had he acted prudently in compelling the disguised officer to serve the process in the presence of Mrs. Delmar? Should he treat the messenger who brought this scandalous official libel with civility? Should he take him into confidence? What, indeed, should he do?

Within the brief space of three minutes he had many times doubted whether, after all, it was a prudent thing for a man of business, and a man of the world, to let his wife know all his secrets. At last he resolved to pursue in this emergency that frankness and uprightness towards his wife, which had been the source of so much comfort to them both in those various emergencies which even the serene life of a prosperous London tradesman occasionally encounters.

The wife had looked on the previous scene in amazement and fear. The changing hues of her husband’s countenance, the twitching of the muscles in his face, the spasmodic movement of his limbs, under suppressed rage, disgust, and dread, told her that the document she had seen handed to him was the premonitory note of something very dreadful. If she had not so well and thoroughly known the rectitude and honourableness of the father of her children, she might have jumped to the conclusion, in her bewilderment, that he had committed forgery, or murdered some one, and that the summons was a warrant for his apprehension on a charge that might have consigned him to Portland or led him to the gallows.

The officer was the first to break silence.

“It is a painful duty, sir.”

“Never mind. But what does this mean?” Mr. Delmar replied, rapidly passing from affected indifference to painful curiosity.

“You see, sir, what it is,” said the officer.

Had Mr. Delmar’s leg and boot been slighter than they were, a smile might have passed from the inner to the outer man of the speaker.

“I know, sir, what it is,” retorted Mr. Delmar; and summoning all his moral resolution, and lifting himself to a height of moral dignity, which perhaps he had never occupied in any one moment of his wedded life, from the day when in his young and pure manhood he had taken that woman, every way worthy, to be his partner and help-meet to the altar, he added:

“I am very glad indeed, sir, for one thing only,—that I did not consent to see you, or accept at your hand this infamous paper, unknown to my wife.”

Still Mrs. Delmar was silent, bewildered, and intensely anxious.

“I have done my duty,” said the officer, in an apologetic tone, glancing at the door, as if desirous of withdrawing.

“You may leave,” said Mr. Delmar.

I draw a veil over the scene which followed. It is enough, at all events, the reader should know that Mr. Delmar read the document to his wife, explained its exact purport, and craved her assistance in penetrating the mystery. He had no occasion to ask her whether she believed him guilty of the offence attributed to him. She volunteered an assurance of her belief in its untruthfulness. She felt and declared that it was the result of some awful mistake of personal identity, or some most foul conspiracy.

It would be incorrect to say that the interchange of confidence did not leave a painful sense of the possible consequences of this mysterious incident; yet it may be affirmed that the event did not estrange a particle of that woman’s love, nor for a moment excite in her breast one flimsy or evanescent doubt of the fidelity of her husband.

The unfortunate man who was thus called upon to defend himself against a charge of which he was no more guilty than my reader is, went to his lawyer, who said he could not make it out. This gentleman, Mr. Drawly, was at a loss to determine whether his client was fool enough to be deceiving him, or whether he was the victim of what Mrs. Delmar had called a foul conspiracy, or whether an artfully planned scheme of extortion had been practised against him.

I was now consulted. I should have liked to have been intrusted with full personal discretion, so that I might have investigated the mystery in my own way. I think I might have more easily cleared it up, if I had not been embarrassed by the definiteness of my instructions. I was, however, told to inquire, in the first place, whether Selina Wilkins had employed any solicitor, and if so, to put myself in communication with him. I was told to use my best skill in tracing what I could; at the same time, if the professional man on the other side were a man of reputation, to deal frankly with him. I was to explain the position in life and the character of the defendant, and urge the improbability of his having committed any such offence against domestic propriety as that he was charged with; and I was told to endeavour to get the affair cleared up or settled without scandal or notoriety.

I did as I was requested. My habit, when my instructions from solicitors were definite, was to follow them implicitly. This commonly saved me much trouble, and when the result was not unsatisfactory I liked that course all the better; but sometimes the plan a little tantalised and vexed me, because I conceived that through it I missed my aim, and did not obtain the credit by success I might otherwise have done.

In this case I ascertained that the young woman had, on the recommendation of her former master and mistress, employed a solicitor, who stood very high among the lawyers in that part of the country where he dwelt. He received me courteously, and expressed his willingness to tell me all about the case. He, however, insisted that the defendant must be a wily rascal, a consummate hypocrite, a mean-spirited fellow, &c. &c. He told me there could not be the shadow or shade of a doubt about the case; and he entered into the matter in the spirit of a partisan imbued with the righteousness of the side he was engaged to fight on.

As to the identity of the person, he thought any defence on that head must break down; for he had obtained, through his agents in London, a description of Mr. Delmar, which corresponded exactly to the description given him by his “unfortunate client.” It is true that the poor girl had not, he said, seen the fellow since her misfortune, because she had not the money to pay visits to London; nor, indeed, was her strength sufficient to enable her to make that journey and back without peril to her life. Grief and shame and bitter mortification had held her tongue until the last possible moment; and it was only when material evidence of her wrong-doing became palpable to her mistress, that she admitted the injury which had been done her. “Why, sir,” observed the provincial lawyer, “even after the poor girl’s condition had been ascertained, she refused to tell who was the author of her misery, and clung to the foolish belief that, as he was a perfect gentleman, he would one day redeem his promise by making her his wife. The way it was found out, sir, was this. She went home to be confined. Her mother one night searched her little portmonnaie, and there found the blackguard’s card. So her friends ascertained his name and address.”

When I had obtained these particulars from Selina Wilkins’s attorney, it was almost post-time; so I wrote an account of my interview with the lawyer as rapidly as I could, and sent it to London to the solicitor from whom I had received my instructions.

I had an answer by electric telegraph, desiring me to pursue my inquiries, as there could be no doubt the case was one of conspiracy or fraud.

Some of the further particulars of this mysterious case had perhaps better be stated in the brief narrative I can furnish of the inquiry before the magistrates.

On the day appointed for the hearing Mr. Delmar came down from London, attended by his confidential and most respectable solicitor, and by a gentleman of the long robe whose name had figured in a thousand Old-Bailey narratives. The young woman was examined. Amid tears and sobs and threatened hysterics, she related her story. It was to the effect that a gentleman, or “commercial,” she styled him, who had visited the town of ——, and stayed five or six times at the hotel where she had been in service, had paid his addresses to her with great ardour, and, under cover of a promise of marriage, effected her ruin. She had no hesitation in declaring that the defendant was the man. The card on which was printed his name and address was produced in Court. A severe cross-examination by the defendant’s counsel did nothing to shake these allegations. Although the gentleman had not been many times to the hotel in question, he appeared quite familiar with the town, and she had seen him enter a rival hostelry before she knew him as one of her master’s guests or customers. The defendant was sworn. He denied that he had ever seen the young woman before, or that he had been in the town for several years, or that he had ever in his life stayed at the hotel where she had been employed.

The complainant’s attorney argued that the case against the defendant was conclusive. It did not, he said, admit of a shadow of doubt. He heaped vituperative aspersions upon the head of the defendant, for adding insult to injury by his disreputable defence. The defendant’s counsel, on the other hand, contended that the evidence of the complainant was incomplete; that it was in several respects highly improbable; and that it should not counterbalance the testimony of the most respectable defendant in his own behalf. The learned gentleman called upon the magistrates to dismiss the case, and intimated that, if the decision were against his client, he should appeal. The magistrates agreed with the complainant’s attorney; expressed an opinion that she was a much ill-used young woman; and said a few things uncomplimentary of the defendant, upon whom they expressed their willingness to do what, by the way, they could not help doing, I believe—that is, give him an opportunity of appealing against their decision.

It will occur to the reader that there were several means of rebutting some of the special facts upon which the complainant’s case must have rested, as it did rest, although I omit them for the sake of brevity, as they are not necessary to the explanation I have to give of one leading fact.

The reader will wonder how that card of the defendant’s fell into the hands of the complainant. I will say at once, in order to clear away some mystery, that the young woman herself was no doubt honestly mistaken, although somewhat rash in the evidence she gave as to the identity of her undoer.

But, unless some confederate had given her that card, how could she have obtained it? It must have been palmed off upon her by some unmitigated villain, who was content to divert inquiry from his own track into that of an innocent and right-minded man’s household, to the peril of the destruction of his own and his family’s happiness.

To track this miscreant was my special mission. I had not much time to effect a discovery before the appeal must be heard and decided.

Mr. Delmar could not help me. He had given his card, at various times, to various people; and within a few years a few hundred persons might have been the conscious or unconscious media, direct or remote, of conveying the fatal pasteboard from his hand to that of the complainant.

After I had been a week engaged in the effort to track the double culprit—having, let me frankly say, no clue by which I hoped to discover him—I was getting weary of the task, when a ray of light dawned through the imperfect memory of Mr. Delmar. He recollected that, about ten months before the complaint was laid against him at ——, he had been obliged to visit Norwich on urgent business. A man who owed him a considerable sum of money was then in embarrassment, and had called a meeting of his creditors, at which Mr. Delmar was invited to attend. After this business had been completed, he intended returning to town by a late train, but allowed himself to be detained in conversation with his fellow-sufferers until it became necessary to abandon that intention. He accordingly put up for the night at the Saracen’s Head Hotel, and sought to while away the hours which intervened before bed-time by a social pipe and glass in the commercial room. Here he met, as a stranger of unpretentious manner always does, with a cordial greeting and good-fellowship. One man, however, Mr. Delmar became very chatty and familiar with. This man, who told him his business—that is to say, what “line” he was in—in the course of conversation took out his card-case and was about to hand Mr. Delmar his card, when unfortunately, as he said, he found that he was out of cards, but he told him his address. Mr. Delmar also took out his card-case, and, very unfortunately indeed, as the sequel shows, he gave the commercial his printed name and address.

I was not long in drawing the inference—nor would any person, I apprehend, be—that this commercial was the villain of my story.

With a photograph of Mr. Delmar in my pocket, I speedily took my ticket for Norwich, and had not much doubt about overtaking the rascal.

Would the reader like to know how I got hold of the fellow? It will appear a very simple and easy process when explained, and I don’t take much credit for it. Give a shrewd man a clue, and I warrant you, if he have time and opportunity, he will follow it to the end.

Well, then, the way I pursued the clue to its extremity was this. I concluded at once in my own mind that this man’s “proclivities” had been manifested wherever he went, and that at more than one of the hotels and commercial inns on his road he would have left a clear recollection of his name and line on the retina of a pretty chambermaid.

I was right. After making myself agreeable by innocent devices with the chambermaids at the Saracen’s Head Hotel, at Norwich, I ventured to let one of them see the picture of the man I wanted. I saw at a glance that no tender regard for him was felt by this female observer. I noticed something like pique, or it might be disgust for him. This was enough for me. I frankly told the young woman that I wanted to track and punish him for a mean and vile crime. I saw that, although chambermaid at an inn, she had a woman’s sense of propriety. However, to make doubly sure of her aid, I appealed to her by another argument, which might be supposed to have some influence with a young woman who had to live upon small fees and perquisites. I offered her 5l. reward if she enabled me to discover him, and in earnest of my sincerity and means of so rewarding her I handed her a sovereign at once. She told me she thought my photograph was a copy of the features of Mr. John Brown, who travelled in the cigar line, who had been at that inn some time ago, and who might be expected again in a week or a fortnight at most, as the time for his visit to Norwich must have almost come round. She said she would show the photograph to the other servants, if I would lend it to her, and as I could easily get another, I did so. The rest of the servants agreed that that portrait was not exactly like Mr. John Brown, but it was something like him too. “Very like him,” one said. Next morning’s delivery brought to the hotel, among other letters for expected people (which letters where placed in a rack in the commercial room), two for Mr. John Brown of London. The next day Mr. John Brown of London arrived, and I was struck by the resemblance of the man as he opened the door of the commercial room, in which I was then sitting, a little anxiously watching for his arrival. It is needless to take the reader through the subsequent steps of my investigation. He will see that I had almost bagged my game. It is enough to say that a few inquiries upon the subject elicited the fact that a regular traveller (on the road in which the town of —— and the Griffin’s Head Hotel were situated) being suddenly taken ill, and many accounts being due to the house he travelled for on that line, Mr. John Brown was ordered to do the midland journey for him a few times. It was on one of these journeys that he found his evil opportunity for seducing the domestic of the inn, and playing off upon her the mean trick which led to the summons against Mr. Delmar, the reckless testimony the complainant bore as to his identity, and his condemnation by the justices. It is only necessary to add, that the decision against Mr. Delmar was quashed at the Quarter Sessions; and that his character as a man of unblemished honour and domestic virtue was, if possible, strengthened by the ordeal he had to pass through.