A Successful Detective.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 26 June 1914, Page 8

A Successful Detective.

"I suppose the joke is on me," said the detective, "and if it wasn't for the fact that others are telling the story I would say nothing about it. I was called into the chief's oflice the other day and given a burglary case to look up. The only possible clue that existed was a description of a suspicious character who was seen near the house where the burglary was committed, shortly before it happened. The party who had seen the suspicious character had been able to give a good description of him, and I was instructed by the chief to visit the shady spots in the city and see if I couldn't run him down and make him give an account of himself. "I have tracked worse cases than that, and I started out with the idea that I would have the man wanted behind the bars before the day was out. "But it was not as easy as I had anticipated. The description did not fit any old crook that I knew, and I was positive that I was on the trail of a new and dangerous man. "I spent the day making the rounds of the low localities where the thieves gathered, but without finding any one that answered to the description given me. "About nightfall, when I was tired and discourag-ed, I chanced to catch a glimpse of my own reflection in a mirror behind the bar, and I was thunderstruck to see that my own reflection answered to the description of the party that I was looking for. Like a flash it dawned upon me that I had passed the house where the burglary had taken place shortly before it happened. With a horrible suspicion of the truth of the matter I looked up the party who had furnished the description and was readily identified as the man he had seen. i "I had been chasing about town till day in a vain attempt to run myself down. But then I succeeded, and that is some satisfaction."