Universitätsbibliothek HeidelbergUniversitätsbibliothek Heidelberg
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THE WRONG UMBRELLA.

" Mr Samuel Whitmore," cajmly answered the gentle-
man.

" Son of Mr Whitmore of Castleton Lee?"
"The same, sir."

" Then you have a brother, I suppose ?" stammered the
jeweller. "There has been a mistake of some kind."

" I have no brother, and never had," quietly answered his
visitor; " and I never bought an article in this shop that I
know of, and certainly did not purchase the things which you
have here charged against me."

"A gentleman came here—drove up in a cab, just as you
have done—and presented a card like this," said the jeweller,
beginning to feel slightly alarmed. "Surely I have not been
imposed upon ? and yet that is impossible, for the things were
safely sent home and delivered at your house."

The gentleman smiled, and shook his head.

" I thought it possible that my father might have ordered
and received these things," he politely observed, " but' on
making inquiry I learned that not only was that not the case,
but no such articles ever came near the house."

This was too much for the jeweller. He touched a bell and
had the apprentice lad, Edward Price, sent for, and drew from
him such a minute account of the delivery of the parcel, that
it became the gentleman's turn to be staggered and to doubt
his own convictions. The lad described the house, the hall,
and the clean-shaven footman so clearly and accurately that
his narrative bore an unmistakable impress of truthfulness.
The gentleman could, therefore, only suggest the possibility of
Price having mistaken the number of the house, and the things
being accepted as a present by the persons who had thus re-
ceived them by mistake. But even this supposition—which
was afterwards proved to be fallacious—did not account for the
most mysterious feature in the case—how the things had been
ordered and by whom. It was clear to Mr Ward that the gentle-
man before him and'the buyer of the presents were two distinct
persons, having no facial resemblance; but the new Mr Whit-
more having, in his impatience to be gone, drawn from his
pocket a gold watch, with the peculiar black dial already
described, a fresh shade of mystery was cast over the case.

" I have seen that watch before," he ventured to say.
" The gentleman who ordered the things wore just such a
watch as that. I saw it when he was leaving. And he had on
his finger a diamond ring very like that which you wear. I*
 
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