themselves with undesirables, governmental information exude
from State portals in a peculiar manner, business secrets pass into
the hands of rivals, racehorses develop strange and untimely diseases,
husbands take long and mysterious trips from home--a thousand exciting
and worrying things may happen to the astonishment, distress, or
intense interest of nations, governments, political parties, or private
individuals, which from their very nature are outside the purview of the
regular police. Here, then, is the field of the secret agent or private
detective, and here, forsooth, is where the detective of genuine
deductive powers and the polished address of the so-called "man of the
world" is required.

There are two classes of cases where a private detective must needs be
used, if indeed any professional assistance is to be called in: first,
where the person whose identity is sought to be discovered or whose
activities are sought to be terminated is not a criminal or has
committed no crime, and second, where, though a crime has been
committed, the injured parties cannot afford to undertake a public
prosecution.

For example, if you are receiving anonymous letters, the writer of which
accuses you of all sorts of unpleasant things, you would, of course,
much prefer to find out who it is and stop him quietly than to turn over
the correspondence to the police and let the writer's attorneys publicly
cross-examine you at his trial as to your past career. Even if a diamond
necklace is stolen from a family living on Fifth Avenue, there is more
than an even chance that the owner will prefer to conceal her loss
rather than to have her picture in the morning paper. Yet she will wish
to find the necklace if she can.

When the matter has no criminal side at all, the police cannot be
availed of, although we sometimes read that the officers of the local
precinct have spent many hours in trying to locate Mrs. So-and-So's lost
Pomeranian, or in performing other functions of an essentially private
nature--most generously. But if, for example, your daughter is made the
recipient, almost daily, of anonymous gifts of jewelry which arrive
by mail, express, or messenger, and you are anxious to discover the
identity of her admirer and return them, you will probably wish to
engage outside assistance.

Where will you seek it? You can do one of two things: go to a big agency
and secure the services of the right man, or engage such a man outsid