him
to suspect the wrong persons. I tell you that confidently; and I will
even go farther. I will undertake to give a decided opinion as to why
Mrs. Yatman took the money, and what she has done with it, or with a
part of it. Nobody can look at that lady, sir, without being struck by
the great taste and beauty of her dress--"

As I said those last words, the poor man seemed to find his powers of
speech again. He cut me short directly as haughtily as if he had been a
duke instead of a stationer.

"Try some other means of justifying your vile calumny against my wife,"
says he. "Her milliner's bill for the past year is on my file of
receipted accounts at this moment."

"Excuse me, sir," says I, "but that proves nothing. Milliners, I must
tell you, have a certain rascally custom which comes within the daily
experience of our office. A married lady who wished it can keep two
accounts at her dressmaker's: one is the account which her husband sees
and pays; the other is the private account, which contains all the
extravagant items, and which the wife pays secretly, by installments,
whenever she can. According to our usual experience, these installments
are mostly squeezed out of the housekeeping money. In your case, I
suspect, no installments have been paid; proceedings have been
threatened; Mrs. Yatman, knowing your altered circumstances, has felt
herself driven into a corner, and she has paid her private account out
of your cash-box."

"I won't believe it," says he. "Every word you speak is an abominable
insult to me and to my wife."

"Are you man enough, sir," says I, taking him up short, in order to save
time and words, "to get that receipted bill you spoke of just now off
the file, and come with me at once to the milliner's shop where Mrs.
Yatman deals?"

He turned red in the face at that, got the bill directly, and put on his
hat. I took out of my pocketbook the list containing the numbers of the
lost notes, and we left the house together immediately.

Arrived at the milliner's (one of the expensive West-end houses, as I
expected), I asked for a private interview, on important business, with
the mistress of the concern. It was not the first time that she and I
had met over the same delicate investigation. The moment she set eyes on
me she sent for her husband. I mentioned who Mr. Yatman was, and what we
wanted.

"This is strictly private?" inquires the husband. I nodded my head.

"And confidential?" says the w