THREE "DETECTIVE" ANECDOTES.

I.—THE PAIR OF GLOVES.

"IT'S a singler story, Sir," said Inspector
Wield, of the Detective Police, who, in
company with Sergeants Dornton and Mith, paid
us another twilight visit, one July evening;
"and I've been thinking you might like to
know it.

"It's concerning the murder of the young
woman, Eliza Grimwood, some years ago, over
in the Waterloo Road. She was commonly
called The Countess, because of her handsome
appearance and her proud way of carrying
of herself; and when I saw the poor Countess
(I had known her well to speak to), lying
dead, with her throat cut, on the floor of her
bedroom, you'll believe me that a variety of
reflections calculated to make a man rather
low in his spirits, came into my head.

"That's neither here nor there. I went to
the house the morning after the murder, and
examined the body, and made a general
observation of the bedroom where it was.
Turning down the pillow of the bed with my
hand, I found, underneath it, a pair of gloves.
A pair of gentleman's dress gloves, very
dirty; and inside the lining, the letters TR,
and a cross.

"Well, Sir, I took them gloves away, and I
showed 'em to the magistrate, over at Union
Hall, before whom the case was. He says,
'Wield,' he says, 'there's no doubt this is a
discovery that may lead to something very
important; and what you have got to do,
Wield, is, to find out the owner of these gloves.'

"I was of the same opinion, of course, and
I went at it immediately. I looked at the
gloves pretty narrowly, and it was my opinion
that they had been cleaned. There was a
smell of sulphur and rosin about 'em, you
know, which cleaned gloves usually have, more
or less. I took 'em over to a friend of mine
at Kennington, who was in that line, and I put
it to him. 'What do you say now? Have
these gloves been cleaned?' 'These gloves
have been cleaned,' says he. 'Have you any
idea who cleaned them?' says I. 'Not at
all,' says he; 'I've a very distinct idea
who didn't clean 'em, and that's myself.
But I'll tell you what, Wield, there ain't
above eight or nine reg'lar glove cleaners in
London,'—there were not, at that time, it
seems—'and I think I can give you their
addresses, and you may find out, by that
means, who did clean 'em.' Accordingly, he
gave me the directions, and I went here, and
I went there, and I looked up this man, and
I looked up that man; but, though they all
agreed that the gloves had been cleaned, I
couldn't find the man, woman, or child, that
had cleaned that aforesaid pair of gloves.

"What with this person not being at home,
and that person being expected home in the
afternoon, and so forth, the inquiry took me
three days. On the evening of the third day,
coming over Waterloo Bridge from the Surrey
side of the river, quite beat, and very much
vexed and disappointed, I thought I'd have
a shilling's worth of entertainment at the
Lyceum Theatre to freshen myself up. So I
went into the Pit, at half-price, and I sat
myself down next to a very quiet, modest sort
of young man. Seeing I was a stranger
(which I thought it just as well to appear to
be) he told me the names of the actors on the
stage, and we got into conversation. When
the play was over, we came out together, and
I said, 'We've been very companionable and
agreeable, and perhaps you wouldn't object
to a drain?' 'Well, you're very good,' says
he; 'I shouldn't object to a drain.' Accordingly,
we went to a public house, near the
Theatre, sat ourselves down in a quiet room
upstairs on the first floor, and called for a
pint of half-and-half, a-piece, and a pipe.

"Well, Sir, we put our pipes aboard, and
we drank our half-and-half, and sat a talking,
very sociably, when the young man says,
'You must excuse me stopping very long,' he
says, 'because I'm forced to go home in good
time. I must be at work all night.' 'At
work all night?' says I. 'You ain't a Baker?'
'No,' he says, laughing, 'I ain't a baker.'
'I thought not,' says I, 'you haven't the looks
of a baker.' 'No,' says he, 'I'm a glove-
cleaner.'

"I never was more astonished in my life,
than when I heard them words come out of
his lips. 'You're a glove cleaner, are you?'
says I. 'Yes,' he says, 'I am.' 'Then,
perhaps,' says I, taking the gloves out of my
pocket, 'you can tell me who cleaned this
pair of gloves? It's a rum story,' I says.
'I was dining over at Lambeth, the other day,
at a free-and-easy—quite promiscuous—with